The Merry's Sea
by Aldura Rising
Summary: A few small changes can force the winds of fate to blow astray, and the ships that catch those winds off their course. In one timeline, circumstance prevented Usopp from leaving Water 7, and led to his capture by Franky and becoming Sniperking... but what if he had set sail as planned? Canon divergence at episode 237/chapter 334.
1. Pirate Blues

The title of each chapter of this story is taken from the title of a song, ones I love and which resonate with the feelings I tried to bring forth with each chapter. A relevant snippet from the song's lyrics tops each chapter as well. I strongly recommend you find and listen to these songs for the fullest experience of this story; I'll be sure to advise whether the song in question would be best listened to before or after reading the chapter in question, as it may vary.

Chapter one's title is drawn from the song 'Pirate Blues' by As Cities Burn. Listen to it before or after reading the chapter.

* * *

 _Oh, I wanna find out I'm wrong_

 _And every road leads us home_

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

He was broken and bruised, and the bandages that snugly wrapped about half of his body were growing stiff from dried blood and inactivity, but Usopp couldn't bring himself to move enough to change them. He had barely been strong enough to drag himself onto the Going Merry's deck, and it took all his willpower to carry up the medical supplies that Chopper had left on the ground beside him-

 _Don't think about him_ , Usopp chastised himself, cutting off his train of thought before a certain cheerful, gullible doctor's furry face could insert itself into his mind- _he'd been crying, biting his lip hard to try not to wail anymore, trying to put on a brave face because Zoro's cold eyes were still fixed on the young reindeer's trembling shoulders, and Usopp forced himself to stare blankly into the distance-_

 _Stop it! Stop thinking!_ Usopp stuck his bandaged fist in his mouth and bit down, hard enough that the dried blood on them cracked and new blood welled up from torn scabs to wet the dirty linen anew. It was so hard, but he knew he had to banish all thought of _them_ from his mind. Otherwise, Usopp would never think about anything else again.

Laboriously, Usopp raised his head to stare at the battered tin plates that girded his beloved Merry's splinter-studded mast. They would need replacing, he knew. As would the steel plates reinforcing her hull, and the strips of steel that bolstered her keel. The chips and cracks and peeling paint was hard to look at, but every bit of it was still Merry. His Merry, now and forever. Only his, now. He was all she had left in the world, the only one who would still fight tooth and nail to repair her and sail her well. Usopp sighed and let out an involuntary groan as he levered himself up onto his knees.

It was still dark, but Usopp had passed out right after flopping down onto the deck and he couldn't guess how long he'd been out. He wanted desperately to get some real sleep, but he had work to do.

The supply room was depressingly empty; some dried goods, a few spare boards, a box of nails, and a single rusty steel plate the size of his arm were all Usopp could find. The rest of the room was occupied by cobwebs, empty crates, and outlines of dust on the floor where other stored items had once sat. Usopp found himself drifting in and out of awareness as he stared at the bare spots on the floor, until he noticed a single tangerine sitting abandoned between two sand-filled ballasts. It was fresh; it had obviously fallen out of a sack as it had been carried out the the hold, along with almost everything else. Usopp blinked a few times as an absurd scene of Nami pestering the others to go back and retrieve the lost fruit played on a loop in his head. He almost smiled, but the throb in his cheek as the corner of his mouth pulled up made him remember why he couldn't.

Usopp was no shipwright- he admitted that much himself, freely, no matter how little respect he had for the opinions of _certain members_ of that particular brand of craftsman -but as hard as correctly repairing the Merry's various scuffs and cracks was, it was three times as hard to do it at night. The hurricane lantern sitting on the deck beside him made the task marginally easier, but Usopp still felt his eyes straining as he replaced the warped boards around the base of the Merry's main mast. The waves splashed quietly against the coast, rocking his ship gently, but aside from that there was almost no sound but the sound of Usopp's hammer.

Usopp's focus was iron-tight as he put nail after nail into the boards to keep them flush with the rest. It was the kind of work he usually found menial enough to let his mind wander, but tonight of all nights Usopp knew he would not like the places his distracted thoughts would take him. So he focused on minutia, on every strike of the head of his hammer, on the angle of every nail, on the grain of every board, as if such details were the most important thing in the world. This made his work slow going, and Usopp had only just finished replacing his sixth board (and used the last of the spare lumber in the hold) when the oil in his lantern finally ran out. The sudden darkness shocked him for a moment and he stilled his hammer mid-swing, staring at the moonlit outline of his hand against the deck.

Fatigue overtook Usopp as quickly as the returning darkness. He gathered up his tools and lantern and was about to reach down and unlatch the hatch into the men's quarters just below deck when a sharp pain seemed to jolt from his heart and run down his arm, paralyzing his hand just as he touched the latch. Usopp gasped and reeled back, overbalancing and landing square on his rear. His gaze flitted between his hand and the latch for a moment before he clenched his fist and closed his eyes, his brow furrowed.

"Right..." Usopp muttered to himself, and he was distantly surprised at how hoarse his voice had become over the last few hours of silence. He levered himself up off the deck and, rather than heading below deck, climbed the stairs and entered the galley.

The shattered remains of the dining table still lay in the pile on one end of the room where someone had stacked them in preparation of throwing them out. Usopp was surprised to see that one of the spare mattresses for guests had been left behind, rolled up neatly with a blanket and pillow set upon it. Surprised, and some other roiling feelings Usopp was far too tired and unwilling to acknowledge, so he focused on the tired part. It took a monumental effort to roll out the mattress- _I wonder if it's the same one Nami rolled out for Vivi in the women's quarters_ , sprung a thought unbidden into his mind before he dispelled it with a furious shake of his head -and Usopp didn't even bother to extinguish the lights in the galley before he collapsed onto the padded bed. Usopp pulled the blanket onto himself, ignoring the dried blood flaking onto the pristine white of the linens, and closed his weary eyes.

An hour later, Usopp found that despite any and all efforts on his own part, sleep would not come to him. Annoyed and exhausted he stared up at the clock sitting on the lip over the kitchen area of the galley, which read a defiant four in the morning right back at his insistent glare. Groaning, Usopp dragged himself up out of his bed and started rummaging through the fridge, though for what exactly he wasn't sure. The fridge had been cleared out of most supplies, but not nearly all of its stock was gone- _Probably Sanji's doing, he'd never let anyone go hungry- STOP_ -and Usopp's hand curled around a wine bottle that had been opened recently and had a little of its contents poured out for some meal or another. Cooking wine: not exactly Usopp's first choice, but it would have to do. The bottle was quickly uncorked and at his lips.

Sour, sharp, and astringent, the low-quality red wine didn't go down all that easy. Usopp wasn't really much of a drinker, and hadn't even had anything stronger than beer before boarding the Going Merry- _Zoro's unusually mischievous smirk as he handed the bottle of sake over the table to Usopp, a smirk which split into laughter when the young sniper began coughing and spluttering at the strong spirit's burn, joined by Sanji's laughter from the kitchen and Nami chuckling from next to Zoro, as Luffy patted Usopp on the shoulder and giggled that he couldn't stand the taste either-_

 _Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!_

Usopp groaned and brought the wine bottle to his lips once more, taking in great big swallows of the sour wine until it drove the memory away. He surfaced a minute later, gasping and shuddering, more than half the bottle gone. A wave of dizziness washed over Usopp after he finally extinguished the lights in the galley and he sat down hard on his pallet, blinking owlishly in the darkened room.

 _I wish I could just not think about it... about them_ , Usopp thought to himself, taking another heavy mouthful of wine. Even as he adjusted to the darkness he found his vision swimming and blurring as tears gathered at the corners of his eyes. Usopp angrily wiped them away and downed the rest of the wine, then chucked the bottle across the room. It shattered satisfyingly against the far wall, but the catharsis was short lived as Usopp realized he'd have to clean the glass up in the morning. He stretched out on his futon and tried to relax, willing the alcohol to give him a dreamless sleep.

 _I've got a lot of repairs to do tomorrow... and I want to be out on the ocean before sunset... I can't sleep too late... but I wish I could just sleep for a year,_ Usopp's wine-soaked mind seemed to mutter under its breath. As the weight of his eyelids finally became too much to handle, Usopp let himself drift down into sleep... and just before the veil of night settled over him once more, Usopp heard a small, soft voice muttering in the distance, so quiet it might have been a figment of his imagination. His tired mind did not register the words or their source, but he took comfort from them nonetheless.

 _I'll take care of you... I promise..._

 _Good night..._

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

The sun streaming into the galley woke Usopp the next morning as a shaft of golden light slid down the wall to rest directly on his face. The sniper groaned and sat up slowly, stiff and sore from both injury and the unfamiliar sleeping arrangements. A quick, groggy look at the clock told him he'd only gotten about three hours of sleep, but judging by the twinge that was running down his back and the feeling of needle-sharp cotton balls filling his skull, he wasn't going to be getting any more sleep for now. Someone had been yelling something from the shore not too far from the ship just moments ago- two people, perhaps, having a shouted conversation about a storm approaching -but Usopp was not nearly awake enough to really care.

As Usopp changed his bandages (a painstaking process that was made all the more difficult by the stiffness of his joints and the injuries themselves) he considered his options. He found himself muttering under his breath as he worked, both to help him concentrate on his thoughts through his pounding headache and to distract himself from the stabs and throbs of pain that shot through him as he moved his battered body.

"I could just lay low here for a while then head into town... pick up some supplies... I've still got a bit of money left... hm, but the Merry still needs some repairs... and I'm out of wood and tin plates... should probably pick up some tar and pitch too... do I have enough nails...?" Usopp was still muttering to himself as he levered himself up onto his feet and, on a whim, stepped out onto the deck. The wind was blowing steadily in from the east, carrying with it the scent of the sea. Usopp began pacing on the deck in front of the galley, staring at his feet as he walked. "I've probably got enough food to make it to the next island, so I don't need to worry about getting any of that... plus I can fish, and I can always distill some seawater to make drinking water... shouldn't be too hard to put together a little pot still like the whiskey makers back in Syrup had... I'll need to rig something up so I can ply the oars myself if I need to... jeez, I didn't think this could be so hard... all on my own..." Usopp stopped abruptly at the railing facing the coast and looked out at Water 7.

 _I wonder... if they found a hotel to stay at..._ came a thought unbidden to Usopp's head. He gritted his teeth and shook his head vigorously to dispel the unwanted thought, slamming his fist into the railing and grunting at the pain in his injured arm. "Dammit, I can't spend all my time thinking about them!" he growled at himself. Usopp knew he needed something to distract himself, and he knew exactly the thing to do it: shopping for materials for the Merry.

"How much money exactly _do_ I have, anyway?" Usopp muttered as he rummaged about in the pockets of his overalls. That was one small blessing: even though those thugs from the Franky Family had beaten him senseless, they hadn't relieved him of any material wealth other than the original briefcases full of fresh-printed Berries. A cursory search brought up just under 5,000 Berries in small bills and loose change, but Usopp was certain if he took the time he could scrounge up at least three or four times that... in the men's quarters.

 _Well... what do I even have to be afraid of?_ Usopp reasoned as he gingerly made his way to the hatch by the mast. He unlatched it and made his way slowly down the ladder, pointedly staring at his hands and only his hands as he finally alighted on the floor. Usopp took a deep breath, and his nose filled with the scents of unwashed blanket and dirty clothes, along with the strong scent of a certain curly-browed cook's favorite cologne- _Sanji was standing by the couches spritzing his small cut-glass bottle of Eau de Mikanne into the air complaining loudly about how 'some people' couldn't control their bowels as Luffy and Usopp rolled on the floor laughing at how loud Luffy's fart had been, Chopper holding his nose with watery eyes trying desperately to clamber up the ladder to the fresh air beyond the hatch, Zoro waking up from a dead sleep just to yell at Sanji for making the men's quarters smell like 'a damn village market fruit-stand' stop Stop STOP IT DAMMIT!-_

Smell is a powerful subconscious signifier of memory, as Usopp learned. He had to fight back tears again as the waves of memory crashed over him like an unrelenting storm, like a tsunami eight thousand feet tall. _Usopp's first night sleeping on the Going Merry as he tried and failed and tried again to stay in the hammock as Zoro laughed and Luffy frustratedly tried to show him the proper technique ("No, Usopp, you have to get your leg into the hammock before you flop in!" "Not all of us can stretch our legs above our heads like you can, Luffy!")-_

 _Usopp helped change Zoro's bandages after the battle at Arlong Park and the celebration in Cocoyashi as Zoro protested that he didn't need any more bandages and Usopp and Nami shouted him down-_

 _Luffy brushed his teeth with a grumpy expression on his face ("But I don't wanna wash the taste of that meat outta my mouth!") as Sanji did his best to explain basic dental hygiene to his captain ("Look, if you don't brush your teeth they'll fall out and you won't be able to eat meat at all!") and Usopp made a note to try and invent meat-flavored toothpaste the next time he sat down to work on ammo-_

 _Chopper and Usopp were designing a very big banner for their captain's upcoming birthday, working on it in their quarters so as to hide the planned surprise from a nosy, bored Luffy ("Ooh! Ooh! Usopp, can we paint some cherry blossoms on one end, like the Doctor's flag that Luffy protected?" "Of course, Chopper! You just mix the pink paint and I'll tell you the story of how the mighty Captain Usopp was consulted by the committee that designed the world's first cherry trees!" "Wow, seriously?!")-_

"I can't- I can't take it!" Usopp sobbed as he fell to his knees, pounding his fist into the floorboards over and over, trying to drive out the sparks of pain that danced through his body and mind. Usopp let out a frustrated growl and rubbed furiously at his eyes, wiped the snot from his nose and tried to focus on the task at hand so he could _get the hell out of there._

Usopp tore through the few items that had been left behind by the guys, throwing a few unsalvageable scraps of cloth that might have once been a vest or a suit coat or a once-white shirt out of the laundry hamper, digging through the nigh-empty chest that sat against one wall, looking under the rug and under the couch cushions. He worked with a manic speed, focusing on his search and driving every other thought out of his mind. After a while he didn't even remember what the hell he needed that money for in the first place.

An hour later a red-eyed, panting Usopp dragged himself out of the hatch to the men's quarters and slammed it shut, latching it solidly and then re-latching it a couple more times for good measure. He leaned against the mast, trying to slow his breathing and his racing heart, then sniffled loudly and looked down at what he'd found. All in all with his original findings, Usopp had just under 20,000 Berries to his name, mostly in coins, but a few bills and one unusually-crisp 10,000 Berry note he'd found being used as a bookmark in a dirty magazine that had been abandoned under the couch- _if Nami ever found out about that she'd be livid and not not not NOT THINKING ABOUT THIS -_ sat in a small pile in his hands. Usopp swallowed hard and stuffed the money in his pocket, then wandered back into the galley to gather his things and rustle up something to eat before setting out to find a hardware shop.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Water 7 was much more difficult to navigate on foot than by yagara, but after an hour of dead-ends and turnabouts Usopp found himself standing before a shop labeled "Timber & Hardware." Unfortunately, the shopkeeper was currently closing up his shop and was hesitant to do any more business that day, repeatedly mentioning something called "Aqua Laguna" as Usopp tried to convince him to sell to him for almost half an hour. At first he tried to be polite, but after a while his irritation got the best of him.

"Come on, old guy! I've got to make some repairs on my ship before I can set out and I'm all out of supplies. Can't you sell me something?!" Usopp wheedled as the bulky bearded man before him reached up with a long hook to pull down the door to his store. The man hesitated and turned around to face Usopp, an irritated look on his face.

"Look, kid, I'm sorry if it's inconvenient for you, but like I said, Aqua Laguna is coming tonight, so I'm gonna secure my belongings and head for the shipbuilders' island," the man grumbled. Usopp's arms, which had been held in a pleading gesture, slackened and fell limp by his side as he glared down at the sidewalk under his feet.

"Please, mister, all I need is some lumber, some tar, some pitch, and some tin plates!" Usopp said, despondent. "Look, I've got money, I'll take whatever this can get me!" Usopp reached out and grabbed the shopkeeper's free hand, then pulled his wad of coins and bills from his pocket and set it in the man's massive palm. The shopkeeper stared at the pile of money for a moment, then looked back up at Usopp.

"This wouldn't buy you much, you know. Maybe a few eight-by-two boards and a half gallon of pitch and tar, plus, eh... six three-by-three tin plates?" the shopkeeper explained slowly, as if he was talking to a young child. Usopp just clenched his fists and stared at the man with what he hoped was a determined face, but in retrospect was probably nervous and fearful. A silent moment passed before the shopkeeper broke eye contact and sighed, setting his long hook in the corner past the doorway to his store. "Fine, fine, I'll sell you some goods... but honestly, this ain't that much."

"Thank you, old man! I'll take whatever you can sell me and be on my way immediately," Usopp replied cheerfully. The old carpenter made a noncommittal noise in his throat and walked back into his shop, gesturing Usopp to follow. The man set about examining his stock and gathering things while Usopp waited. When the shopkeeper had finally put together his purchase Usopp was a little dismayed by how little his entire monetary worth could actually buy, but he tried his best to hide it. Judging by the shopkeeper's grumpy expression, he didn't do a great job of it.

"I warned ya, didn't I?" the old man growled. "This kind of material is expensive on Water 7 'cause we have to import almost all of it from other islands."

"I-I know... I guess I might need more than that..." Usopp mumbled, a little embarrassed. He opened up his satchel and started to rummage around in it. "Er, how about I trade you some things for more supplies? I have some pretty nice tools and gadgets I don't _really_ need anymore, and-"

"Whoa there, kid, slow down. This is the big city, you know! We don't do barter around here," the old carpenter said firmly. "I'm sorry, but it's cash only." Usopp's face fell despite his best efforts not to seem too disappointed, and the old man sighed. "Kid, what kind of repairs do you even need to make on your ship?"

Usopp was a little taken aback by this line of questioning. "Ah! Uh, well... her main mast is held up by some tin plates and rope girding, but it's been a while since it was all put on there and they need to be replaced... and the reinforcement on her keel needs reinforcing... and she's got some leaks in the hold that a need tarring... and her rudder hangs to one side and needs some patching... oh, and her mizzen mast has some damage to it too... and her side paneling is beginning to get gaps in it-"

"Jumping gerbils, kid, what have you been putting that damn ship through? She sounds like she's about to fall apart," the carpenter said. Usopp felt heat rising up the back of his neck again, but not due to embarrassment this time.

"She's _not_ gonna fall apart!" Usopp barked. "The Going Merry is my ship, and she's one of the greatest ships in the world! She's been to an island in the sky! How many other ships on the ocean right now can claim that, huh?! None!" Usopp paused, panting a little, ready to be rebuked by the old man for being rude. Which was why he was so confused when the shopkeeper began to laugh.

"Har har har har! Ah, you pirate types are all the same, and ya have been since I was younger than you!" the old man roared with amusement.

"P-pirate? How could you tell- I mean, why would you think I'm a pirate?!" Usopp stammered, the prospect of having to face a Navy attack all on his lonesome sending shivers from his spine down to his knees.

"You kidding me? I've been a carpenter on this island for almost ten years now, and I worked on Pucci before that! You live and work in this area of the Grand Line long enough you learn how to tell a pirate idiot from a regular seafaring idiot!" The shopkeeper started to laugh again, and Usopp felt a conflicting desire to run away and to punch the old man in his hairy jaw.

"Har... y'know, kid, I apologize for how I said it, but it's the truth. Every pirate I've met seems to think their ship is the best in the world," the old man said. "But seriously, with the amount of repairs you say you need to do, you'd never finish before tonight. Aqua Laguna will smash any ship left in the water to pieces, and that's a fact no matter how good of a ship she is."

"You keep saying 'Aqua Laguna' like I'm supposed to know what that is," Usopp grumbled.

"Ah, you're right! Sorry, I keep forgetting visitors don't always know these things," the shopkeeper said sheepishly. He reached into one of the pockets of his shirt and pulled out a battered pocket-watch. "It probably won't really show up in force until after sunset, but the Aqua Laguna is a huge storm that blows through this portion of the Grand Line every year. It usually comes out of the east, and brings huge waves and winds that can tear the skin off your bones. It's the most dangerous weather in the first half of the Grand Line, for sure."

 _Bet it's got nothing on the Knock-Up Stream_ , Usopp thought to himself, bitterly, but in truth he was beginning to get a little worried by the man's words. "Well, what do locals do with their ships? During the storm, I mean?"

"Heh, you'd be hard pressed to find a local around here who owns a ship and doesn't also own a private dry-dock to slap it in. Most everyone takes the Sea Train when they need to get to another island. Most of the time we warn any visitors about it well in advance so they can get their ships out of the path of the biggest waves, but there's often a pirate crew or two whose ships get wrecked by Aqua Laguna." The old man paused for a moment to reach into another pocket and grab a little flask, made even more comically tiny by the massive size of his hands, and tap a long sip from it. "If your ship is as battered as you say, your only safe bet is to get as far away from Water 7 as fast as possible. I'd suggest heading north in the direction of the Calm Belt bordering the East Blue. You'll probably hit Bardigras Island by evening if you leave now and can get a straight shot across open seas."

"The Merry needs to be fixed as soon as possible, though!" Usopp protested. "I can't just let her keep on suffering! She needs me to make those repairs, so we'll be- she'll be whole again."

"Then work fast and pray it holds, kiddo. You need to leave by four in the afternoon if you wanna have any chance of escaping the storm's leading edge," the shopkeeper said, oddly cheerful now. Usopp considered his options, absent-mindedly letting himself be ushered out of the shop as the old man carried his bundled purchase, then reached back and pulled down the heavy door with the hook. Usopp didn't break out of his thoughtful state until the shopkeeper handed him his purchase, and Usopp strained under the weight of all that wood and everything else.

"Oof!" Usopp grunted as little jolts of pain sparked from his various injuries. _Carrying this back is gonna be a paaaain_...he thought as the shopkeeper smiled.

"Hm... looks like you're a little over-burdened there, kid," the old man said, with a mocking tone. He reached into his pocket and grabbed the watch hidden there, examining its face for a moment before replacing it and sighing. "Well... I suppose I'll help you carry your purchase back to your ship, whaddaya say?"

Stunned, Usopp gaped for a long moment before replying. "Y-you mean it, old guy? Well..." he said as a twinge of hurt pride struck him. "I don't _really_ need help, but... I mean, if you want to carry something, I'm not gonna tell you no!"

In the end, the shopkeeper wound up carrying the bulk of the purchase while Usopp carried a bag containing a gallon of pitch, some tar, some nails, and a coil of rope (which Usopp did not remember asking for or paying for, but he wasn't about to question it), which was still heavy and made his injured body hurt the whole walk back to the cape, but Usopp tried his best not to show. It was a fairly short walk this time- Usopp told the shopkeeper where the Going Merry was moored and the old carpenter seemed to know exactly where it was and how best to get there -but Usopp's back and ribs were still store when they finally set down the repair supplies on the coast. He took a moment to catch his breath and tried to pop some joints and massage some muscles while the shopkeeper gave the Merry a cursory examination. His long, low whistle after a moment wasn't a terribly comforting response.

"Tsk, tsk, kid... this ship is in even worse condition than you said!" the old man muttered, a big frown on his bearded face. "You're never gonna get her worthy to sail out of the path of a storm like Aqua Laguna in time."

"Yeah... well... that's... my problem..." Usopp panted, still trying to reorient from the struggle of carrying the weighty sack back from the shop. "I'll do my best, and... I'll do it for her. That's all that matters."

"Don't you have a crew or any friends who could help you out with this?"

Usopp clenched his fists and glared at the ground, struggling to say nothing. _I'm done... done thinking about them_... "I'm alone... except for the Merry. She needs my attention right now, so if you don't mind, I'm gonna get started on fixing her up, and I'd appreciate not having any more _expert_ critiques of her condition-"

"You really are an idiot, I was right," the old shopkeeper said matter-of-factly. Usopp turned from the ground to glare at the old man instead, but stopped short of an angry retort when he saw the man was smiling. "Look, I'm no shipwright, but I know a hopeless cause when I see one... and I know a stubborn fool of a pirate, too. Looking at your bandages I'm gonna guess you're in a lot of pain, eh?" Usopp just grunted, to which the man chuckled. "If I let you go and kill yourself trying to patch up this pretty little hulk here- or even worse, let you sail off into Aqua Laguna in sub-par condition! -I know my dear old mama would come back from the dead just to nag me about being heartless. And if there's one thing I want in this world, it's to never hear her screeching at me again. So, I'll cut you a deal: you promise to take this ship to a _professional_ as soon as you get out of Aqua Laguna's path and take their advice seriously, and I'll help you put her in better shape."

"Wha- you mean it, old man?!" Usopp exclaimed, relief he hadn't expected to feel flooding his tired frame.

"The name's Happa Yamao, kid, but call me Big Yama," the shopkeeper said. He held out a hand to Usopp expectantly. "So, we got a deal, kid?"

Usopp considered for a moment, torn between accepting help and maintaining his pride and his certainty that nobody understood the Going Merry as well as him. He looked at the Merry's figurehead, wishing she'd give him an answer to his hurting worth, but he knew that at this point his pride meant nothing. The Going Merry was everything.

"Alright, Big Yama... deal," Usopp said as he put his scrawny hand in Big Yama's meaty paw. "And the name's Usopp. _Captain_ Usopp."

"Ooh, captain, he says," Big Yama chuckled as he enclosed Usopp's hand in a powerful grip and shook it hard enough that Usopp's elbow and shoulder both popped uncomfortably. "Well then, Captain Usopp, you reckon we should get started on putting this girl back into sailing shape? What's _her_ name, again, anyway? I didn't catch it earlier when you were shouting at me, har!"

Usopp freed his hand from Big Yama's grip and turned to face the Merry, a little more pride swelling in his chest; not for himself (even though it was kinda cool to be called captain by someone other than himself), but for his ship. _His_ ship.

"Her name's the Going Merry. And the sea belongs to her."

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Working on the Going Merry's numerous wounds was slow going and hard work, even with the assistance of Big Yama's seasoned talent. Usopp realized within the first half hour that he had vastly underestimated the true depth and number of the Merry's injuries. For every easy patch and simple application of tar and pitch, there was a deep crack in the frame or an infestation of termites that had to be dealt with. To be honest, it was a little embarrassing every time Big Yama would point out a new problem to be patched that Usopp had missed. The old carpenter wasn't malicious about it though; it was obvious he only wanted to help, and Usopp felt doubly frustrated with himself for even feeling a little upset with the man.

Their work continued as the sun crested noon and began its slow descent into evening, until Big Yama straightened up from patching a dented tin plate on the Going Merry's bow and put his hand on his lower back, groaning as he pushed hard into his spine until a series of small _cracks_ was heard. Usopp leaned over the railing on the foredeck and glanced down at the old man. "Uh, Big Yama... you alright? Need to take a break?" he asked hesitantly.

"Har har... no, Usopp, no, I'm fine! This ship of yours is a real beauty, and she's worth a little back pain," Big Yama chuckled, grinning up at Usopp. It was obvious to Usopp, however, that the grin was a little strained, and that the huge old shopkeeper was moving more slowly as the day rolled on. Truth be told, Usopp was beginning to feel new aches and pains creeping up his injured body to settle in right next to the old ones, and he would not have minded a break. Plus, all he had eaten that day was a bit of bread and dried fish before setting out to find a hardware shop, and the yawning pit in his stomach was grumbling and clenching on a terrible emptiness. Usopp considered telling Big Yama that in a way that would avoid making it obvious how much he wanted to keep going despite his pain. The practical side of Usopp's mind was muttering about how he'd never be able to sail effectively if he exhausted himself, and he had to admit it was sound reasoning.

Usopp had leaned back over the railing and was just about to tell Big Yama he should take a break if he needed it when the grumbling in his stomach suddenly grew in volume and for a brief, mortifying moment drowned out even the surf and the sound of Big Yama sawing a board. The old shopkeeper paused in his work and looked up at Usopp, who grinned a little sheepishly. Big Yama chuckled and said, "Y'know, hard work is hard work, and I don't know about you, but I'm getting a bit peckish. It's about time for a lunch break as far as I'm concerned."

"Uh... y-yeah...lunch sounds good," Usopp mumbled as his stomach growled loudly yet again. He scurried over to help Big Yama up the rope ladder, and the carpenter reached into a bag he'd brought along to the ship and withdrew two packages of four rice balls each. They settled down on the outer railing of the Going Merry and ate, and as they did Big Yama cheerfully regaled Usopp with tales of his youth on the island of Pucci.

"Woah, you were a bandit?!" Usopp exclaimed around a mouthful of his third rice ball. Big Yama laughed as Usopp coughed and choked a little around some rice which had gone down the wrong tube due to his shocked reaction.

"Har, it's how I got my nickname!" the old shopkeeper explained. "I was a tall kid- as tall as the bandit chief himself when I was only twelve! -so I got a reputation for being like a big ol' mountain... plus, the chief was such a drunk he always stumbled on the last 'o' in my name, anyway!"

"I just can't believe you were, y'know, a ruthless bandit," Usopp said after he'd recovered. "You're such a nice guy! The only bandits I've ever met were jerks."

"You're one to talk, being a pirate and all!"

Usopp had to admit, the old carpenter had a point... not that he said so aloud. Big Yama watched his expression go from indignant to thoughtful to bashful all in a split second and started laughing again. "Har har! Well, I suppose there's a good reason I got out of the whole banditry business more'n ten years ago. And not just because the Navy finally decided to send some backup to Pucci's wimpy police force, either!"

"Haha, yeah... one fight with the Navy woulda been more than enough for me, too, but..." _Those crazy, fearless idiots kept on dragging me into trouble..._ Usopp finished silently. It hurt to think, and it hurt more to speak about them. Big Yama, to his credit, seemed to get the gist of the unspoken sentiment.

"It's hard to leave friends behind," Big Yama said after a brief moment of quiet. "I haven't been back to Pucci in ten years now. Sometimes I still think about the old clan and the chief, and I wonder if they're still fleecing tourists and mugging smug noble turds..." The old shopkeeper gave Usopp a pointed look. "No matter how bad the reason you had for leaving, anyone who used to be in something as tight-knit as a bandit clan or a pirate crew is gonna leave with some regrets."

Usopp pursed his lips and stared at his last rice ball. He wanted to respond- _your clan didn't abandon you when you became a burden, though,_ perhaps he'd say -but he kept his silence for a while longer. Big Yama seemed to get the hint, and they finished their meal break without further conversation.

"Welp," Big Yama said as he crumpled up the paper that had been wrapping the rice balls. "Best get back to work. I needed me a good meal, and I feel like I could work on this little ship for the rest of the night!" The carpenter clambered down the rope ladder and alighted on the rocky coast. "Too bad for us, we've only got another two hours or so, so let's work fast!"

"Er... yeah! Right" Usopp said, trying and failing to match Big Yama's enthusiasm. Despite still feeling beat down and sore, however, Usopp was bound and determined: he'd certainly fight his way through his aches and finish repairing the Going Merry. _His_ Going Merry. She deserved nothing but his hardest work, after all.

Two hours seemed to pass even faster than the hours of work before, but Usopp tackled his tasks with renewed vigor. In the end, he and Big Yama accomplished more than Usopp had ever expected: not only the repairs that the Merry desperately needed, but a number of reinforcements and cosmetic repairs Usopp had put out of his mind before the old shopkeeper offered his help, along with things that would have taken far too much time to do alone, such as replacing some of the Going Merry's rigging and putting together docks for the oars so Usopp could use them by himself.

After they were finished, Usopp stood on the shore and looked up at the Merry. Despite her patchwork appearance and the plates and boards reinforcing a good fifty percent of her hull, the little caravel looked more put-together than she had since Jaya. However, after having worked on her for most of the day Usopp could no longer fool himself into pretending she was totally fine: it was obvious to him, now, that the Going Merry's wounds were deep, and despite how much work he and Big Yama had put into fixing and reinforcing her, there would come a time when she would no longer be able to sail.

 _Of course there will... I'm not stupid_ , Usopp reasoned, running his eyes along the Merry. _I know that any ship will one day reach its limit. It's obvious. I've known that the whole time._

 _But I also know that this isn't the Going Merry's time to die._

Usopp felt a heavy hand land on his shoulder jarringly, jerking him out of his thoughtful moment, and he looked up to see Big Yama standing beside him, looking almost as proud of the Going Merry as Usopp felt. The enormous carpenter gave a chuckle and glanced down at Usopp. "She has some life in her yet, I'd reckon," he said with a nod before he walked over to finish packing up his own tools. Usopp smiled and looked out at the sea.

The wind had been picking up steadily the whole day, slowly growing from a stiff breeze to a continuous, blustery gust. Even now the waves that crashed against the rocky shore and the Going Merry's hull were growing taller moment by moment, and the sky was darkening more and more, the clouds marching solemnly across the sky from the east.

"This storm really is gonna be huge, huh?" Usopp muttered. He heard Big Yama hum behind him.

"It's a monster of a squall, that Aqua Laguna is," Big Yama said seriously. "You're lucky we finished patching up your ship this early; any later, and I'd have doubts about you escaping her even if you took her tailwind and went straight to the west. As it stands, you've got a good chance of taking it at an angle and heading toward the Calm Belt. You should run into some islands before that, though. Bardigras Island is your best bet. There's a town there that used to be a pirates's cove, called Bluesend. Mention my name to the innkeeper at a pub called the Poxy Wharf-Rat and you might get a discount if the old codger's still alive." Usopp heard Big Yama's heavy footsteps crunching on the rocky coast, and suddenly the tall old carpenter was standing beside him with a wistful smile. He had something clenched in his meaty fist, which he held out for Usopp to see. "Also, I noticed you were missing one of these, so I fished this out of my old gear." Big Yama opened his hand and Usopp was stunned at what he saw.

"Is that... an Eternal Pose?" Usopp said quietly. Big Yama nodded, then he laughed aloud.

"Har! It's not something I've ever had need for- you remember what I told ya about the sea train around here, right? -but it was given to me as payment from an old pirate about nine years ago, when I was still getting my start in my shop." Big Yama grabbed Usopp's hand and set the Eternal Pose in it, and up close Usopp could see that the glass on the dome was scratched and chipped, and the wood frame was worn and salt-stained, though he could still make out the word 'BARDIGRAS.' Usopp looked up into Big Yama's face and willed himself not to cry from gratitude.

"I hadn't even thought of it, but Na- er, the navigator took the Log Pose we... they had." The awfulness of his oversight finally really struck Usopp and he placed his face in his hand. "And I woulda just sailed out into the Grand Line with no way to navigate. I really am stupid, aren't I?"

"Har, well, you seem like you might've been through a lot recently, so it makes sense you'd lose track of something like this, eh?" Big Yama chuckled. Usopp smiled and closed his hand over the Eternal Pose. "You'll have to buy a new Log Pose on Bardigras Island though. Or steal one! You are a pirate, after all, eh? Har!"

"Big Yama... I really can't thank you enough. For everything," Usopp said sincerely, pocketing the Pose.

"You can thank me by not dying before you get where you wanna go," Big Yama said with a grin. "You better get that ship out to sea fast. Judging by the sky, Aqua Laguna will be here in force by sunset. As for me, I gotta go finish preparing my shop so I can head up to the shelter on the shipbuilders' island."

"Oh, man, I forgot about that. Will you have enough time!?" Usopp asked, feeling guilty for possibly taking up too much of Big Yama's day, but the old shopkeeper just laughed.

"Oh, when you've been boarding up the windows and sandbagging the doors as long as I have, you tend to figure out how to do it fast." Big Yama turned around and went to grab his toolbag. "You be safe, and don't do anything too stupid, kid!" With that, he walked briskly back toward the backstreet area of Water 7. Usopp watched him go with a mixture of gratitude and bewilderment. For a moment he wondered if this was some residual effect of travelling with Luffy for so long, that his weird ability to make friends with everyone might have rubbed off on him a bit. Unfortunately, that just made him think about Luffy, and the still sore throb of his cheek reminded him why that was a bad idea.

 _I'll have to find a way to repay Big Yama for real someday... but for now, I've got to go... I've got to go home._ Usopp swallowed and climbed up onto the Going Merry, then began preparations to set off. Once the sails were drawn out (a difficult task to accomplish by his lonesome and with all his injuries) and the anchor raised up (a right pain in the ass), the blustery winds from the east caught the Merry up in their flow and drew her away from the shore, and Usopp with her.

Usopp stood on the fore deck, leaning on the railing beside the Going Merry's figurehead, and he stared out at the open sea in front of him. Not because he needed to, at the moment, but because Usopp knew that if he didn't keep his gaze fixed forward, it would drift back toward Water 7, toward... them. And he might never be able to pull it away.

 _I don't need to feel guilty for leaving. This is what we all wanted, really. We're only getting what's best for us. Luffy and them can keep sailing on down the Grand Line... and I can take the Merry out to sea and let her be the ship she deserves to be. The ship of a brave warrior of the sea._

 _We're heading home, Merry._


	2. White Squall

The title of this chapter is taken from the song 'White Squall' by Stan Rogers. There's another reference to a famous Stan Rogers song in the story itself; see if you can spot it, perhaps!

* * *

 _I could feel her keeling over with the fury of the blow/_

 _I watched the rail go under then, so terrible and slow_

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

The Going Merry was not a very large ship, being a caravel, but it was still a bit of a struggle for one injured man to sail her on his own. Usopp found himself having to run back and forth across the length of the ship, adjusting the rigging, checking the wind direction, stopping in the middle to shift the whipstaff a degree or two, all while keeping his footing on the swaying deck and trying not to strain his injuries. He also had to keep his eyes on his new Eternal Pose, which Usopp was quickly discovering could swing suddenly at an angle at any moment when Usopp failed to notice the Merry being caught in one of the many treacherous hidden currents of the Grand Line.

All in all, Usopp was beginning more and more- unwillingly, mind -to think about how much Nami wasn't given the respect and praise she deserved, like, ever.

 _And these aren't even stormy seas at the moment,_ Usopp found himself thinking as he wrestled with the mainsail as much as he could without hurting his healing ribs. Usopp glanced back to where he'd come from: Water 7 was no longer visible over the horizon, and the sky was steadily darkening as the clouds rolled in from the east, bringing with them strong winds and rolling waves. Just a little rougher than average at the moment, yet Usopp was fighting to keep the Merry on a straight course. Straight to _where_ ¸ he still wasn't certain.

 _But I need to get the Merry out of the path of this storm no matter what,_ Usopp thought as he ran from the mid-deck up to the galley to adjust his trajectory. Since his Eternal Pose was locked onto Bardigras Island, which was technically north-northwest of Water 7, he'd have to keep correcting for the wind direction so he didn't blow off course, but as long as the needle of the Pose pointed the same direction as the Going Merry did, he'd keep his course. Keeping a steady track as the effects of Aqua Laguna spread further and further from Water 7 would be a serious challenge, but the Going Merry would make it to port.

At least, Usopp hoped.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

As the afternoon wore into evening, Usopp was losing his strength quickly. He'd barely had a moment to stop for a snack between trying to manage sailing the Merry on his own, and his still-healing injuries were worsening the matter. Even worse, Usopp began to wonder if he really had escaped the wrath of Aqua Laguna as the wind and waves grew fiercer and fiercer and the darkening sky began to drench the deck of the Going Merry and everything on it in cold rain. He could hardly conceive of a storm that could be _this_ intense so far from its center.

 _I don't think I can keep this up for much longer_ , Usopp thought as he put every ounce of his unimpressive weight into shifting the whipstaff in the galley against the prevailing winds' attempts to blow him off course. He was gritting his teeth so hard his jaw ached, a dull warm throb exacerbated by another pain in his face he didn't have the mental energy to acknowledge at the moment. So Usopp simply gritted his teeth all the harder and kicked against the floorboards, drowning out the spiking pain in his heart with a myriad much more definable pains in his bruised, exhausted flesh.

A chance moment, a glance up from the draining exertion of trying to steer such a small ship in a growing storm, allowed Usopp the first moment of hope he'd felt in hours: a bright light, swinging out through the storm to pass right along his line of sight, shone through the open door of the Merry's galley. _A lighthouse!_ Usopp would have breathed a sigh of relief had he the time or energy to do either while trying to shift the whipstaff properly. _Where there's a lighthouse, there's and island. And where there's an island... it's probably..._ Usopp spared just a split second to confirm his trajectory on his Eternal Pose. _Bardigras Island, dead ahead!_

Even as the wind gusted and blew the rain right in through the galley door, Usopp felt an elation he hadn't felt since... since a while ago. _I steered the Merry right toward an island from leagues away, all by my self! Ha! How's_ that _for useless?!_ Usopp wasn't sure who he meant to address with his triumphant thoughts, but it didn't really matter to him at the moment. All he saw was a goal in sight, shelter and relief from a storm, and Usopp couldn't help but savor the thought of snuggling into a warm inn-room bed for a night as the lighthouse drew nearer.

During his moment of distraction, unfortunately, Usopp's glee didn't stand a chance against the sudden, hollow scraping noise that rumbled through the Going Merry's frame and shook him to his bones, louder even than the thunder. It took Usopp in one moment from joy to horror as his brain connected the dots, and he immediately felt like a rank amateur at sailing. _Lighthouses mean islands... but they also mean..._

The Going Merry scraped loudly along another submerged rock and Usopp gave a desperate cry and leaned back, pulling the whipstaff to the right with all his might as the scraping noise died off and the ship turned with a wet creak, the prevailing winds he'd been fighting for over an hour catching up the sails and pulling them taut as the Merry turned away from the lighthouse. Usopp's eyes darted frantically over the water that thrashed in his ship's path, trying to discern where the rocks were hidden beneath the surface. Another teeth-chatteringly loud echoing shriek of wood on stone informed him he wasn't doing a very good job of guessing where they were.

 _C'mon, Merry, work with me_ , Usopp thought desperately. _We're gonna get to a dock soon... we have to...!_ He gave up trying to spot the rocks that continued to bump and scrape against the Merry's hull and instead tried to spot the lights of a village or settlement through the driving rain, staring out the galley doorway. He brought up one hand and pulled down the right lens of his goggles, adjusting the focus for a moment with a quick twist of its rim.

With his vision enhanced, Usopp could see a dim glow off in the distance. It looked like it might be lamplight, but he till couldn't be sure. _Gotta get closer_ , he thought as the Going Merry scraped against another rock. Usopp pushed and pulled on the whipstaff, reacting more to the sounds of the Merry's hull running into the submerged stones than any visual cues. Instead he locked his gaze on that distant light, watching it grow brighter in contrast to the surroundings growing darker and darker.

A flash of lightning lit up the night sky in an instant, turning it to daytime for less than a blink. In that moment Usopp saw the origin of the distant light: a small village built up against the coast of a cove, protected from the worst of the waves by the island itself. The image was burned into his retinas as the lightning faded and a cacophonous thunderclap shook the sky, and Usopp pulled against the whipstaff to direct the Merry into the cove's narrow mouth. As he approached, Usopp noticed that the scrape of rocks against his ship's vulnerable underside had disappeared, proof that he'd found the proper route into safety.

The wind and waves carried the Going Merry between the tall hilly spits of shoreline that thrust out from the island to form the cove, and Usopp immediately noticed the waves calming and the rocking of the ship becoming less violent. The wind still blew hard and fast, but Usopp could at last relax a little as the stormy, rainy gusts guided the Merry across the small bay towards the docks that spread out in front of the town. Usopp could see many more lights now that he was closer to the village, lamps and lanterns being tossed on their hooks by the storm.

 _Finally... now I just have to place to dock_ , Usopp thought, relieved. It seemed like the fatigue of a day of hard labor followed by an evening of navigating a ship in stormy seas might make hm drop to the deck and just pass out, but Usopp was determined to find a bed in a tavern of some sort. As the Going Merry approached the docks, Usopp abandoned the galley for a moment to rush down the stairs and into the weapon storage and cannon deck. He retrieved one of the collapsible oars that were kept in one corner and ran back out onto the fore deck, assembling the oar as he went.

On the fore deck of the ship Usopp reached out the extended oar, bracing it under his shoulder as he aimed toward the docks which were slowly approaching. As the ship came up closer to an empty pier Usopp jammed the end of the oar against one of the pilings, grunting as the force of impact nearly knocked him off his feet. Usopp skidded backwards on the wet wood of the deck until his back pressed against the railing on the fore deck, and he used its solidity to anchor himself against the push of the oar against the pier.

Ever-so-slowly the Merry came a stop before bumping gently against the pier, and Usopp immediately pulled in the oar and scrambled to the mast, climbing as fast as he could through his injuries and exhaustion. He furled the mainsail, and then slid on the guyline back down to the deck to go bring in the rear sail. By the time he was finished Usopp felt as though his legs were going to give way, and he took a moment to catch his breath before he went into the gundeck and dropped anchor. Usopp dropped the rope ladder over the Going Merry's side and made his way onto the pier.

The wind was still blowing madly even behind the shelter of the cove, and Usopp had to brace himself against its driving force as he walked down the pier to the docks over the shoreline. Out in the storm itself Usopp's vision was frightfully limited by the pounding rain. He could see the vague outline of houses and shops up the terraced hill from the docks, and the fluttering light from the lamps and lanterns revealed little more than the locations of doorways. Usopp's various aches and pains were throbbing with each labored step as he walked through the town, looking about for a sign indicating the tavern Big Yama had mentioned.

A gust of wind suddenly took Usopp's feet out from under him and he stumbled, trying to collect his balance. His flailings took him face-first into a post, and Usopp groaned as he fell on the ground. He rolled onto his side and held his nose, rubbing the distinctive appendage to ease the pain from his faceplant, and looked up into the rain, blinking against the water droplets. A flash of lightning lit up the sky, revealing that the post's arm held a swinging sign bearing the name "The Poxy Wharf-Rat Tavern."

"Huh... well, that's good..." Usopp muttered to himself. He groaned as his picked himself up off the ground as thunder rolled overhead, and Usopp noted vaguely that according to some weather trivia he'd heard some time ago from... someone- _probably from Nami NOT NOW_ -when the flashes of lightning and thunderclaps began to occur further apart, it meant the storm was moving away from you. Usopp could only hope that he wasn't misremembering as he climbed the stairs onto the tavern's porch and half-stumbled through the door.

Usopp stomped his feet against the welcome mat in the tavern's doorway, shivering with a mixture of cold and exhaustion. Luckily, the storm outside seemed unable to penetrate the thick timbers of the rustic building's walls, and a fire crackled merrily in a hearth on the far end. The rest of the large common area was lit with an eclectic array of oil lanterns and candles set on the weathered tables, and a few electric lights that hung from the ceiling above the bar looking out of place. As he stood there dripping, a cranky-looking old man with a fake gold tooth smirked in his direction from behind the bar.

"Ya look a bit wet, young man," the old bartender said in what might have been the biggest understatement of the century. Usopp just stood there for a moment, staring at the man and looking unimpressed.

"In case you hadn't noticed, old-timer, it's really, _really_ storming right now," Usopp groused. As if on cue the shuttered windows along the wall suddenly leaked the bright flash of lightning from outside, followed a few moments later by a rolling, sustained thunderclap. The bartender scowled at Usopp.

"I don't appreciate sass, sonny. If yer just here fer a comedy routine ya might as well turn right back around and find a nice dry anywhere else t' sleep," he said sternly, and Usopp winced but held back the sarcastic reply sitting at the tip of his tongue. The old man nodded, satisfied, and gestured for Usopp to come forward. "Now yer gettin' my floor wet, so go take a seat by the fire and I'll bring ya somethin' t' drink."

"Uh, thanks... but I don't really have a lot of money," Usopp muttered as he walked with a slight limp toward the worn-looking chairs that sat before the fireplace. "I just wanted to get in out of the storm, and maybe buy a place to sleep." The bartender replied with a noncommittal grunt, his back turned to Usopp as he puttered around behind the bar. Usopp hesitated for a moment before he sat carefully in one of the chairs, sagging as his body reacted to being able to relax for the first time in hours. He took stock of the myriad aches and pains that spiderwebbed across his body and realized rather viscerally how lucky he really was to have endured the whole afternoon and evening of sailing all on his lonesome through stormy seas.

 _I just hope that luck holds out... because I'm gonna need it..._ Usopp's worrying for the future was interrupted by the arrival of the bartender with a steaming mug in his hand, which he set on the low table that sat between Usopp's chair and the fireplace. The old bartender gave a little groan as he lowered himself into the chair adjacent, closing his eyes as he leaned his head back. Usopp stared for a moment, but the bartender didn't seem likely to notice or care, so Usopp reached for the mug- which was hot enough to be almost painful to hold -and took a slow sip. The taste of strong alcohol mulled with equally strong spices washed over his tongue, and Usopp coughed as it burned down his throat. The bartender did actually notice this and sat up straight, smirking as Usopp recovered from his coughing fit.

"Wouldn't do fer ya t' brave this storm only t' die in my tavern, boy," the bartender said, and Usopp blinked the tears from his eyes and glared at him.

"Jeez, gramps, what did you put in this, _all_ the booze?!" Usopp demanded hoarsely. The bartender just chuckled.

"Ya must be younger'n ya look under all them bandages, boy, if yer sputterin' from a hot mug o' wassail." The bartender crossed his arms and switched from a smirk to scowl; Usopp was beginning to suspect the old man lacked the capacity for other expressions. "Here I give ya t' drink outta my own kindness with nary a thought o' chargin' ya fer it, and ya spit on my hospitality and mock my mixin'. Yer a nervy little sprat, aren't ya?"

"Uh... I guess?" Usopp said as he tried to puzzle through the bartender's terminology. "Look, I'll thank you for the drink, I just meant that a little warning wouldn't've been, y'know, too much to ask?" He refocused his attention on the mug held in his hands, which _was_ helping drive the numbness out of his fingers, and took another sip. It was still a strong and heady drink, but Usopp was prepared for it this time, and instead of burning the hot liquid warmed him pleasantly from the inside out. "See? It's fine if I know what to expect!"

The bartender contemplated Usopp for a moment before he smirked again, then stood up to was back behind the bar. Usopp watched him rummage around beneath the bar before he returned holding an unlabeled ceramic jug with a cork in the top, which the bartender quickly extracted with his teeth before spitting it in a shockingly graceful arc across the room. The cork clattered into a filthy spittoon sitting in the corner, and the bartender sat back in his chair.

"There," the old man sighed, taking a swig from his mysterious jug. "Now that we've both got our own drinks, ya can tell me what yer doin' wanderin' into my bar durin' Aqua Laguna."

Usopp blanched at the sudden question, but after a moment's consideration he figured a simple answer wouldn't hurt. "Well, I was just... y'know, trying to escape the storm and all."

"That all?" the bartender grunted, taking another swig from the jug. Usopp was beginning to notice a distinctly sour smell wafting from the direction of the jug's open neck, but he elected to ignore it.

"Not much more to tell, I guess..." Usopp paused, caught between the conflicting concerns of trying not to tell too little to satisfy the man's curiosity, and trying not to tell so much he'd get even _more_ curious about his lone customer's intentions. He resolved to deal with this tension like he always dealt with it: grandiose lies. "I mean, I _am_ a world-famous explorer looking for my next great discovery as I journey across the Grand Line with my crew of loyal adventurers, buuuut I guess this island has already been discovered, so I don't really have a reason to stay long or anything. Just til the storm passes."

The bartender nodded calmly. "An adventurer, eh?" he muttered, then took a long gulp from his jug. "Where's them crewmates o' yers, then?"

Usopp choked on a sip of his drink and started coughing and spluttering yet again, and he struggled for a followup answer as he recovered from his surprise. _I hate when I get caught in a spiralling lie like this. It never goes my way!_ "Er, they're on my ship! Well, some of them." Usopp took another sip as he collected his thoughts. "Our fleet has almost a hundred ships, with crews as small as ten to as large as two hundred, adding up to over eight thousand sailors in all! We sail in formation to a major island, and then split off from there to meticulously catalogue every new island and all the astounding creatures and people we encounter! We just split up after making landfall at Water 7, but this damn storm sort of took us by surprise, so we've been fighting tooth and nail to sail safely through the wind and waves and continue our journey!" Usopp couldn't help himself- he was beginning to get into his own story -and he stood, placing on foot on the chair as he posed (he thought) very dramatically and impressively.

"The name of the Usopp Adventurers is known far and wide! Hailing from the East Blue, we've braved the dangers of the Grand Line to obsessively search for new and exotic locations, undiscovered civilizations, and terrifying monsters the very sight of which would turn an ordinary man's mind inside-out! But not us, oh no, not us! As the leader of this expedition I, the great Captain Usopp, have fought against uncountable odds and witnessed things that would drive you to madness and despair, all for the sake of the spirit of scientific discovery! There's not a sea in the whole world I wouldn't sail to uncover the mysterious secrets of life itself!"

Usopp stood there posing for a moment longer, feeling rather proud of himself. He finished the mug of hot cider in his hand and set it down on the table, then finally looked at the bartender again. The old man was nodding steadily still, eyes closed, expression neutral, taking occasional sips from his jug. Usopp didn't quite know what to make of the old man, so he shrugged and sat down in his chair again.

"So..." the bartender finally said, drawing the word out as he opened his eyes and locked his stare on Usopp's nervous gaze. "Yer a big deal, eh?"

Usopp tried to roll with his previous bravado. "Well, sure! Uh, not to make a _thing_ out of it or whatever, but I do have a bit of a reputation..." Usopp let his sentence trail off as the bartender stood without another word, grabbed his jug and the mug on the table and walked back to the bar. Usopp watched him go, perplexed, but the man's intentions became more clear when he showed back up with a second mug in hand, both of them steaming hot and filled to the brim. He sat down and handed Usopp his mug, then raised his own towards Usopp in a gesture of salute.

The bartender's face was unreadable, and Usopp displayed a grin he hoped wasn't as nervous and confused as he felt and returned the salute. The both of them took a long, slow sip of the hot drink almost simultaneously, and sighed contentedly in unison as well. The bartender turned to look at Usopp.

"Yer full o' shit," he said matter-of-factly, and Usopp found himself stuttering and sweating. The bartender's smirk grew until it split into a broad grin, and he began to laugh loudly. Usopp frowned at this, his face beginning to flush with embarrassment. The old man finally stopped laughing and shook his head, taking another sip. "Ahaha... young sprat, I haven't heard such a batch o' blatant crap in years. And I'm a tavern-keep! Y'know the sorts o' folks what make their way t' my bar? Liars and fools who think they can lie."

"Ah, uh, well..." Usopp was at a loss, and was mentally kicking himself. _That lie got away from me, dammit! I should've just said I was a merchant or something..._ "Look, I-I'm not saying I didn't possibly maybe sorta make one or two little details sound a bit more impressive than the absolute truth, but the spirit of what I said is one hundred percent honest!" The bartender's grin morphed back into that smirk from before, smug and amused.

"Heh, looks like yer type two on that list: a fool who thinks he can lie," the bartender chuckled. Usopp's face lit up bright red with embarrassment and he stared at the wet floor between his feet. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the old man quirking on eyebrow in his direction. "I'd say ya paid yer keep, though."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Usopp muttered, perking up a little.

"Yer a bad liar, kid, but the story itself weren't bad," the bartender said. He raised up his mug again and drained it in several long gulps, then wiped his grinning mouth on the back on his hand. "I reckon it's worth a free drink or two, eh?"

"Oh! Well, uh... thanks, mister," Usopp said sheepishly. He held his mug tightly between his hands and took another sip. _Well, at least he's not mad or something..._

"I'll even let ya have a free night here if ya can tell me the _truth_ ," said the old bartender, and Usopp pressed his lips into a frown as he stared at his mug, his jaw twitching from how hard he was gritting his teeth. For one brief, glorious moment he'd hoped the old man would drop the issue, but no such luck.

"I'm fine with paying for a room, old man... er, probably," Usopp grunted, suddenly unsure of his claim. He hadn't really kept track of how much money he actually had left now. Had he spent every Berry of it on buying those materials from Big Yama? Usopp took a moment to pat his pockets, and was mortified to find that they were all empty. He glanced at the bartender's face from the corner of his eyes, trying for subtlty, and was even more ashamed to see the self-satisfied smirk making yet another triumphant return.

"If ya don't got the Berries and ya want t' sleep on dry land in a dry bed, ya better get t' tellin'," the old man said, his tone almost petulantly cheerful. Usopp really wanted to say something mean and angry, express his displeasure with being held up at sleep-point for a storytelling ransom, but he just couldn't think of anything that wouldn't sound lame or sour the man's interest in him enough to get Usopp kicked out on his ass into the rain-lashed streets. So he swallowed his pride and tried for politeness.

"If it's all the same to you, old timer, I'd rather not talk about it," Usopp said, crossing his arms. "Y'know why people tell lies, right? It's because... well, because the truth would be harder to tell right." Usopp finished off his drink and considered the dregs sitting in the bottom of the mug, not wanting to look the bartender in the eye. "Or the maybe the truth isn't interesting, or it's not worth telling because no good will come of it. The truth isn't always... happy."

The bartender let out a low whistle. "Sprat... there ain't no way I'm lettin' ya off without tellin' the whole story _now_ ," he said, and Usopp turned his head to glare at the old man, who matched his glare with that infuriating smirk. "So go on and tell! Ya got a warm bed t' win and nothin' t' lose."

"You know what- no. No thanks, old man," Usopp spat out. "I think I'll just sit here in front of the fireplace all night. You gonna kick me out if I don't spill my whole life story?" _Not that I'd be able to sit here awake all night, though... those two drinks were pretty damn strong_.

"I wasn't before, but if ya continue with them bad manners I might," the old man replied, still smirking. "Besides, it's not like I don't already know plenty. I know yer name's Usopp, and yer sailin' by yer lonesome from Water 7. I bet if I went out in the mornin' and took a gander I could pick out yer ship at the docks- it's been a slow month fer Bluesend, and if we've got more'n one out-of-towner visitin' right now I'll eat my teeth -and I bet I know what kinda ship it'll be!"

Usopp blinked. "Oh yeah?"

The bartender nodded. "It'll be a _pirate_ ship, most like."

Usopp sighed. "What is it with old men and being immediately able to identify pirates? Why is this the second time this has happened to me in single day?! And _how_ exactly did you come to that conclusion, huh?! I didn't give single solitary clue that I was a pirate! At least Big Yama listened to me talk about my ship for a while before guessing that, but here _you_ are just pulling that knowledge out of your _ass_ -"

"Hold on, sprat, back up a tick," the old man interrupted. "Ya know Big Yama?"

Usopp stared blankly at the bartender for a moment before it clicked. "Oh, right! He did say I could probably get a discount if I mentioned his name here didn't he? Man, I can't believe I forgot all about that part..."

The bartender didn't seem to like that. " _Discount_?! What's that overfilled meat pie think he's doin', givin' out promises o' _discounts_ t' any old brat what comes waltzin' into his shop lookin' fer directions?" He sighed, shaking his head disappointedly, as Usopp blinked in confusion for a moment. The old man leaned back in his chair and slumped, frowning at the fireplace silently. This silence stretched out over an awkward minute, and Usopp finally gave up on waiting for the bartender to speak.

"Look, old man, I didn't just ask Big Yama for directions to the nearest island," Usopp said. The bartender actually turned his head to look at him, one eyebrow quirked inquisitively. Usopp smiled almost fondly when he thought of the huge carpenter. "He actually helped me fix up my ship so she'd be seaworthy enough to escape Aqua Laguna. I would've been smashed into flinders and drowned in the storm without his help."

"Well, well... ya musta done somethin' worth the help, then? The Big Yama I remember didn't just help out anyone who asked fer his time," the bartender said thoughtfully.

"Nope! Big Yama offered to help me out after he helped me carry the supplies I bought from his shop back to the Going Merry," Usopp said with a big grin. "He'd a nice old guy, and he knows a lot more about carpentry than he thinks he does. He even gave me my supplies for super cheap! That's where, ah, all the rest of my... money... went to." Remembering his lingering financial uncertainty put a little bit of a damper on Usopp's good mood- and there was still the matter of procuring a room to figure out.

His worry was interrupted, however, by the bartender suddenly getting to his feet and cracking his back noisily. The old man groaned and looked at Usopp with an annoyed expression, then sighed in a defeated manner. "Fact o' the matter is, sprat, Big Yama's a good man with a good head on his shoulders, and he wouldn't just give ya my tavern's name if he didn't trust ya and like ya," he said, grabbing both of the mugs. "Ya musta done somethin' what caught that old windbag's eye, said somethin' he liked t' hear." The bartender walked back over to the bar and started putting things away as he spoke. "So I'll put my trust in his judgment, I s'pose. The third room on the left is yers fer the night. Just don't leave a mess, y'hear?"

"Wait... what? You mean it, old man?" Usopp asked, rising stiffly from his chair.

"Call me Stalter, sprat, or don't call me at all," the bartender said, scowling. "I ain't even that old! Just get t' yer room and stop botherin' my conscience, alright?"

"Well, gee, thanks! I guess I owe you one now, huh?" Usopp said sheepishly. Stalter snorted.

"Sure, ya can tell me that life story ya been holdin' back on, how about that?" the old man said, smirking again. Usopp just laughed nervously and back slowly in the direction of the room Stalter had offered in reply, before swiftly dodging inside and shutting the door.

"Sleep tight, ya ungrateful pirate!" Stalter called, his voice muffled by the door. Usopp sighed and looked around the room. It was small and simple, just a bed, a table, a chair, and a short dresser with a small mirror hung above it. The room was lit by an oil lamp on the table. As Usopp undressed he examined his bandaged injuries, wincing at each movement as he checked beneath dirty bandages that probably needed changing. Unfortunately, he'd left any extra bandages on the Merry, and his mind was hazy with exhaustion and alcohol.

 _Screw it... I'll change them in the morning,_ Usopp thought blearily as he extinguished the lantern and crawled stiffly beneath the covers of the bed that was so kindly provided for free. Even with all his aches and pains, sleep was upon him in moments like a warm wave breaking across his mind. He drifted off peacefully into his second night sleeping alone in a long time.

 _I wonder if they'll be suprised to find me gone already..._ came a thought unbidden into Usopp's mind as he teetered on the edge of sleep. He rolled the idea around in his head for a little while as bits and pieces of his consciousness seemed to slip away earlier than the rest of him. _I wonder if they'll be disappointed..._ _I wonder... if they'll... miss..._

Usopp was asleep before he could finish the thought. And though his sleep was deep and peaceful, his dreams were full of fire.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

The next morning found Usopp out on the Going Merry just an hour after dawn, checking and re-checking and double-re-checking her for new damage. Luckily, the repairs he and Big Yama had made on the Merry seemed to have held, and a quick dive into the chilly water ( _Cold cold bad idea cold_ ) confirmed that even the numerous encounters with the submerged rocks and reefs the night previous had done minimal damage. Overall Usopp felt rather proud of himself, and of the Going Merry.

"You're definitely gonna make it back home," Usopp muttered to her, placing his palm gently against the Merry's hull and gazing up at her figurehead. Merry's big, cheerful eyes gazed back, and Usopp smiled softly.

"Heh, she's a cutie, eh?" came a voice from behind, and Usopp turned to see Stalter limping down the dock, a sack thrown over his shoulder. The bartender was looking up at the Going Merry's figurehead as well, and Usopp couldn't help but notice the nostalgic fondness that colored the old man's expression.

"You used to be a pirate, didn't you, Stalter?" Usopp asked, though he felt he already knew the answer. Stalter frowned at him.

"A bit presumptuous, eh, sprat?" he said, but then shook his head with a smile. "Truth is, I were a lot o' things in my youth. A bandit, a bouncer, a bodyguard, a fisherman... and yes, a pirate, fer one ill-fortuned journey." The bartender set down his bag and sat himself down stiffly on a piling. He gazed out at the fishing boats heading out into the cove and the sea beyond, waves lapping against the stone and wood of the pier. "We were privateers, in fact, workin' fer my home kingdom t' raid enemy ships when a war was on. Alsid Barret captained, cried the town fer a crew o' fishermen and ruffians what'd give his ship a fightin' chance. _The Antelope_ , she were called, and she was a right sight worse than yer little ship here." He gestured toward some of the more obvious patches on the Going Merry's hull, and Usopp quelled a flare of defensiveness.

Stalter continued, "We set out and were becalmed right away, so we rowed ninety days t' the nearest port t' the enemy, and then headed back after a bit o' rest. On the way back the lookout spotted a big old enemy ship- a merchant's galleon or some such, but not a battleship, no -and Captain Barret had us give chase. Took us two damn days t' catch up, but we took the enemy broadside anyway and fired our measly four-pounder cannons and rattled our sabers at 'em." Usopp sat down on a piling across from Stalter and watched the expressions moving across the old man's weathered face as he told his tale.

"The enemy noticed us, then, and they readied their cannons. Took 'em one shot t' snap the _Antelope_ 's main mast and send it crashing through her deck." Usopp groaned sympathetically, remembering all the abuse the Going Merry's mast had taken in the past. "The captain was smashed under it, and-" Stalter paused a moment to sigh and bend down to grab a pant cuff "-the very top o' the mast took both my legs at the knee."

Stalter lifted his pantleg and revealed shiny metal beneath it, and Usopp couldn't help but gape. It was a much more sophisticated-looking prosthesis than a regular old wooden leg, like the old pirate Chef Zeff from the Baratie had worn; it needed to be, probably, considering that Stalter apparentl had two of them. Stalter let his pantleg drop back down and smirked.

"I survived- forty-five years and I'm still not sure how -and I was picked up from the wreckage three days later by a passing Navy ship. After six years o' travel I landed back home in Pucci. I met the ol' bandit clan, the one Big Yama joined a few years later, and procured myself a pair o' replacement legs in exchange fer my work. Not long after that I left the clan and came here t' Bluesend on Bardigras Island, opened my tavern, and here I been fer a good twenty years now. Big Yama came t' visit when he left the clan and we've kept in touch. And that's how it's been."

Usopp was silent for a while after Stalter stopped talking, and the bartender seemed content just to sit and watch the boats in the bay. Then the old man turned to look at Usopp and smirked. "Well, it seems I wound up bein' the one t' spill my whole life story, eh?" he chuckled, and Usopp blinked before laughing as well.

"It was a more interesting story than mine would be, trust me," Usopp said.

"Reckon I don't believe ya about that, fer some reason. Can't say why, fer sure! Any guesses?" Stalter said sarcastically, and Usopp pursed his lips in an unamused manner. Stalter chuckled again and gestured to the sack he'd set on the pier beside him. "This here's a few extra days o' food and a gallon o' my homemade cider. Take it and feel guilty that ya didn't tell me the truth! It's yer punishment."

"Whoa, hold on! I already owe you an explanation of why I'm here! What'll I owe you for this, my first-born child?!" Usopp said incredulously. "Just admit it, you're a malicious child-snatching sea-fairy trying to trap me in a contract so you can steal my first-born!" Stalter laughed aloud at this, and Usopp joined him.

"Y'know, I'll let ya decide what I'm owed, how about that?" Stalter said as he stood on his prosthetic legs and walked back toward the town. "Or maybe just try not t' die before ya get a chance t' come back here and repay yer debt, sprat!"

"Thanks! I'll try!" Usopp called semi-sarcastically. He took a deep breath of sea air and grabbed the sack of supplies, scurrying up the rope ladder to finish preparing to set off again.

 _I wonder what it is about old ex-criminals and helping us younger criminals out?_ Usopp wondered as he labored to bring up the Going Merry's anchor. _Is it living vicariously through the next generation of troublemakers?_ It was certainly a though worth keeping in mind.

As Usopp finished drawing out the Merry's sails and began directing her toward the entrance to the cove and the open sea beyond, another thought came into his mind.

 _I'd hate to see the kind of guy who'd try living vicariously through Luffy..._ Usopp's cheek stung a little less this time. That was probably a good sign. An auspicious omen predicting easier seas ahead.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

 _I really need to learn not to jinx myself with these things_ , was the prevailing thought in Usopp's head hours later as yet another wave crashed over the side of the Going Merry and nearly carried him off his feet. After some desperate finagling with the sails and the whipstaff at the very beginning of this storm- another one of those famously-unpredictable Grand Line cyclones this time, rather than some great big forseeable storm like Aqua Laguna -Usopp had given up on using them to navigate his way out of this mess, and had instead gone for his next option: the newly-designed Usopp Special One-Man Rowing System!

It was just a couple docks to fit the giant oars into so that one person standing in the middle of the ship could use them both at the same time, but the name made Usopp feel better about their effectiveness.

At almost an hour into this storm, though, Usopp was feeling the strain of trying to right the course of the Merry through the howling winds of a cyclone, a strain which only worsened his still-tender intjuries. The cyclone was almost as fierce as the edge of Aqua Laguna Usopp had fought through the previous night, though less than a tenth the size of that behemothic storm, and moving in what seemed to be the opposite direction (Usopp was no longer really sure what direction he was going, since he'd lost the Sun's east-to-west path by which to navigate in the stormclouds), toward the entrance to the Grand Line.

Usopp had spent the calm sailing of hours previous to consider some options regarding how to leave the Grand Line once he reached its beginnings. He was more than a little embarrassed by the fact that he hadn't even thought about this issue before he left Water 7, but whatever regrets and half-formed ideas for plans he'd made in his head had been blown away by the cyclone.

Another enormous wave rocked the Going Merry, and Usopp fought to remain standing upright relative to the deck as his ship pitched almost all the way onto its side. Usopp grimaced and pumped the oars hard, trying to fight the storm, but the wind and waves seemed to have one goal in mind: carry the Merry into the maelstrom that was certain to exist in the center of the storm and crush the little ship against the rocks at the seafloor.

 _Not gonna happen!_ Usopp growled in his head, glaring through his goggles at the whirling center of the storm. _The Going Merry isn't going to be stopped by something as trivial as a damn cyclone!_

Suddenly the ship jerked violently, but rather than the side-to-side jerking or front-to back pitching caused by the storm itself, the ship was jerked _upwards_. Usopp was thrown into the air and lost his grip on the left oar, clinging to the right for dear life and mentally kicking himself for not tying a rope around his waist. _If the winds carry me off I'm a dead man._

The ship slammed down into the water hard, and Usopp came with it, slamming instead into the deck hard enough that his skull rattled and his knees buckled. Somehow, rather than dying down, this damn cyclone seemed to be getting more and more fierce, and it was drawing the Going Merry into its center far to quickly for Usopp to do anything about it.

 _Dammit!_ Usopp thought, holding on the right oar like his life depended on it (and it probably did) as the Merry pitched forward down the inner slope of a particularly large wave. "MERRY!" Usopp screamed, hoping and praying that she would hold together against the impossible weight of the ocean.

A flash of blue, some odd shape like fluttering cloth, moved in the corner of Usopp's eye for a split second, but as soon as he turned his head to look at it directly the ship hit the surface of the water and the wave broke over it. Usopp lost his grip on the oar and spun off through the water, all the air knocked out of him by something heavy and hard impacting his chest. Dizziness washed over him like the tide and he found himself spiralling down into pitch black nothing, smelling salt and storm and his own blood.

 _Merry...! I'm..._

Darkness took him, and Usopp dreamed of fire.


	3. Disappear Completely

This chapter's title is taken from the song "How To Disappear Completely" by Radiohead. I reccommend you listen to it while readng; that's what I did while writing!

* * *

 _I'm not here_

 _This isn't happening_

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

When Usopp came to, the storm had passed and the noontide sun shone down on him from a still blue sky. Usopp threw his arm across his eyes with a groan to block the glaring light. Immediately he regretted it, as all the muscles of his right side and most of the ones on his left shrieked in horrified protest. Gasping, he raised himself to a sitting position and cast a bleary eye across the Going Merry's deck.

No immediate structural damage presented itself to Usopp. Luckily the sails had escaped being shredded or torn from the rigging, but several guide ropes had snapped and the sails hung limp. At least, that's how it seemed to Usopp at first glance. Why would the mainsail be hanging still like that if not for the ropes securing it to the ship having broken?

Usopp got to his feet stiffly and looked at his hands. The bandages wrapping them had been torn and new dried blood stained the ones remaining. The oars were likely stained with the same blood, and a quick glance confirmed this suspicion. For one of them, anyway; the other oar seemed to be missing.

With another pained groan Usopp placed his head in his hands, unable to bear looking at the ruin of his carefully-designed alternative propulsion system. _I don't have enough spare wood to construct another oar..._ he thought, letting his hands drop to his sides as he made a deliberate march up the steps to the galley. A glance inside revealed chaos: supplies strewn everywhere, Usopp's pallet flung to one end of the room and overturned, a kitchen knife (the only one that had been left behind) embedded in the opposite wall, and one of the last beer casks had cracked and leaked half its contents onto the rug. Usopp resolved to fix these problems after he'd ensured his own health, so he grabbed a bit of dried fish from one of the sacks in the corner and sat down on the deck right in front of the galley to munch and recover.

It was a long time before something struck Usopp as odd. His senses were just regaining their usual sharpness as he finished his small meal and stared up at the sails. _Still... not even a light breeze?_ Usopp wondered vacantly as he shoved the last of his snack into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully. Suddenly, something inside Usopp's skull seemed to click into place with an audible _thud_ , and he clambered to his feet, all-too-familiar panic setting in.

"Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap..." Usopp muttered frantically. He stuck a finger in his mouth to wet it and then held his hand aloft, testing the air. It confirmed what he felt he already knew: the air was completely still. Usopp swallowed heavily and stared up past his hand, past the top of the mast with the familiar black flag hanging limp, and watched a single, small cloud sit motionless far above the Going Merry for a solid thirty seconds. The mass of water vapor didn't even change shape slightly.

 _I... am gonna die_ , Usopp thought as he walked slowly to the ship's edge and leaned over it to stare at the water. The great expanse of briny blue was still as a stone wall, a solid plane of open ocean that stretched as far as Usopp could see with his own eyes. He pulled down his goggles and twisted them to adjust the focus on the magnifying lenses, staring out at the horizon and the sky above it. To his west, nothing but utter stillness; he ran to the other side of the ship (well, hobbled quickly) and saw that the same was true of his east. He thanked whatever powers that be that the sun was beginning its afternoon descent, otherwise he wouldn't even have been able to tell which way he was facing.

Upon the fore deck, Usopp stood near the Merry's figurehead as he looked out at the sea to his north. At the furthest edge of his magnified vision Usopp could barely make out what looked like the darkness of a stormcloud. The far southern horizon, on the other hand, seemed calm, but Usopp could see wispy clouds streaked across the sky, a sure sign of moving wind. No wind to his east or west, but normal weather to the south and the north... Usopp's stomach felt like it was filled with hot lead as he sat down on the rear deck of the Merry, leaning against the wall of the galley and staring at the empty, infinite sky.

 _There's only one place this could be... I've only been here once, but I'll never forget it..._ Usopp thought. The dead exhaustion that weighted his limbs seemed a thousand times heavier than it had before, and despair filled his skull like a bucket of cold pitch. Usopp placed his face in his hands and shuddered.

"I'm in... the Calm Belt..."

~:~:~:~:~:~:~

Utter immobility was bad for one's sanity, it seemed, because not an hour passed before Usopp was up on his feet, pacing back and forth across the deck of the Going Merry, trying desperately to ignore the throbbing pain in several parts of his body, and staring helplessly into the air in front of his face. His thoughts were cloudy and clogged with fear, foggy, oily ' _what if_ 's roiling and churning. _What if I can't get out of here and I run out of food, and the water's too still and warm for fish to gather here? What if I can't heal quickly enough to stand pedaling the water-drawing machine and I run out of drinking water? What if a sea king notices the Going Merry and crushes her in its jaws?!_

On and on, over and over, these thoughts filled Usopp's mind as his body slowly wore down over the course of the than getting any better, his injuries protested at every turn and step and his became more pronounced... and yet he didn't stop moving for more than a moment. The sound of Usopp's steps and his own breathing were alone in the utter stillness of the Calm Belt, and brave warrior of the sea he may have been, the thought of allowing such immeasurable stillness to invade the ship convinced him that it would finally be enough to break him.

Sunset came suddenly, like a thief plucking a golden jewel out of the sky, and Usopp stopped pacing long enough to walk back into the galley and retrieve his lantern. As he shut the door behind himself and stood on the walkway in front of the galley, just about to strike a match and light the oil lantern, Usopp happened to glance upwards, and he nearly dropped his lantern to the deck in shock.

Usopp had grown up on a small backwater island that was very rural, so he was no stranger to a clear and gorgeous night sky. Sailing the Grand Line he had seen even more amazing things, and to top it off the night sky above the Going Merry seemed to be even more amazing than even the clearest night back home whenever it would drop anchor in the open ocean for the night. However, as Usopp gazed up at the sky, standing there on the deck of the Merry in the midst of the calm belt, his eyes beheld the most singularly-beautiful night sky he had ever seen... more amazing than he'd ever even imagined.

The sight of a sky that was not only clear, but which had never in all of history known _cloud cover_ , was like staring into the infinity of time and space itself. Like an unending sheet of black velvet onto which someone had scattered an immeasurable number of priceless gemstones, the sky seemed to shimmer and move like the surf in a normal, active sea would. Usopp walked along the Merry's deck and up onto her fore deck, never lowering is eyes from staring up at the stars, and he sat down with his back against the Merry's figurehead.

 _I guess this counts as a silver lining to being stuck in the Calm Belt,_ Usopp thought as he laid his head back against the painted wood. He sat there motionless for a while, just gazing at the sky, but even with this gorgeous sight before him Usopp could not bear it for long. Even under this beautiful night sky the complete stillness of the Calm Belt pressed against his thoughts like a smothering blanket, a lingerng feeling of _wrongness_ that only served to make his heartbeat pound in his ears. At the same, time, unfortunately, Usopp couldn't find in himself the energy needed to move anymore. His aching body just wouldn't shift an inch.

The silence needed filling, though, or Usopp could feel the frayed corners of his mental fortitude being slowly tugged on by the emptiness of the horribly still air. So he swallowed despite his dry throat and began to speak.

"It's amazing, isn't it, Merry?" he muttered, still not ripping his eyes away from the stars. "I'd never imagined that the Calm Belt would have anything so pretty to see in it... or anything at all, really. It's the nesting-place for sea kings... are their even any islands in the Calm Belts? I dunno... but I know that for the first time since... since-" Usopp swallowed again, trying to hold back _something_ , though he wasn't sure we was ready to acknowledge what it was. "Since that... that night on Water 7... I haven't really _felt_ anything... I've been scared and sad and angry and scared and even a little cheerful when I was talking to Big Yama or Stalter... But mostly I've only felt pain."

The Going Merry was a good audience, it seemed, because she didn't interrupt Usopp's train of thought when he paused to reach into his overalls' pocket an retrieve the small cloth package he'd grabbed from the galley when he grabbed his lantern. He unwrapped it to reveal the small meal he'd prepared for himself earlier, just some sailor's bread, hard cheese, salt beef, and an apple from the sack of supplied Stalter had given him. As he ate, Usopp tried to collect his thoughts, but they were as slippery as the wind, so instead he tried to do a mental tally of the remaining rations he had.

 _With the dried fish, fruit, salt beef, bread, cheese, and a bit of what was left it the fridge, I should be able to survive another week or so_ , Usopp thought as he bit into the sailor's bread and was absently pleased to find it hadn't gone too stale. _That should be enough time to... to figure out a way out of the Calm Belt and sail to the nearest island... man I wish I could've bought a Log Pose at Bluesend... or maybe asked Stalter if he still had his from when he was a pirate. Actually..._

With a harsh groan Usopp set down the cloth holding his food on the deck and rose to his feet, a process which took no less than a solid minute of pausing, straining, and gasping for air. Once up, he limped his way along the Merry to the galley and pushed inside, flicking on the electric lights as he kneeled ( _carefully, carefully, ow god carefully_ ) in front of the sack of supplies Stalter had gifted him with and rummaged through it. He'd only made a basic tally of its contents when he first brought it onto the ship, so he had a sneaking suspicion... or maybe it was a desperate hope. He was starting to confuse those more and more now.

After a few moments of removing every package from the sack and checking their contents ( _the apples I already opened, the gallon of cider Stalter mentioned, some extra salt beef, a small sack of limes, a... harmonica? Alright..._ ) Usopp was feeling both foolish and disappointed. Of course, Statler hadn't given him a Log Pose! Those things were expensive, and the old barkeep couldn't have suspected that Usopp was so useless of a sailor that he had neglected to retrieve one of the most basic necessities for traveling the Grand Line before setting out into the open ocean! Usopp gritted his teeth and rubbed his knuckles into his eyes as hot shame flooded his mind.

 _God dammit... I really am useless... I couldn't even plan that far ahead?! What is wrong with me!?_ Usopp thought as he punched the floorboards, ignoring the shock of pain that ran up his arm and sparked a new ache in every other injury in his body at the same time. However, as that happened, a new realization struck him.

"Wait..." Usopp muttered to himself as he knelt there, staring at the sack laying on the floor before him. "I'm in the Calm Belt... and from what I saw earlier when I was trying to figure that out I must be close the very middle of it, somehow... that storm must have really flung the Merry far." Usopp slowly replaced the items in the same and tied it back up as he mumbled his stream of consciousness into the unmoving air, then stood with a monumental effort, flipped off the lights, and walked back out onto the deck and over to where he'd left his food. As he sat back down, Usopp almost smiled when his eyes caught the glorious starfield in the sky above him.

"I guess it doesn't make sense to try and... uh, paddle, I guess, since I lost an oar... all the way back into the Grand Line and try to navigate _that_ without a Log Pose," Usopp said with what might have been the very beginnings of a chuckle. He picked up his food again and took a bite out of the small, tart apple. "It'd be just about as long of a trip to paddle back to the East Blue. Since this is the northern band of the Calm Belt in the first half of the Grand Line, it's right along the East Blue's border, yeah?" Usopp laid his head back against the Merry's figurehead, and as he stared up at the sky his eyelids felt far too heavy to keep open anymore.

"That's it, then... when I wake up," Usopp said, yawning, "we'll head to the north, back into the East Blue... all I have to do is avoid the sea kings and paddle. I should make it back into normal waters within a week! Don't worry, Merry... even if it hurts to paddle this ship on my own, I'll do it as much as I can, as much as I have to... I know you're hurting so much more than me right now... but you're _my ship_ , so it's my reponsibility to take care of you..."

In the silence of the Calm Belt, with his mind slowly drifting into dreams, it was difficult to tell if he was really hearing anything or if it was just his imagination, but Usopp could swear he heard a small, sad sigh in response to his words. It was less like a real sound carried in the air, and more like a ripple of emotion that went right into his head with no regard for his ears. Usopp tried to keep his eyes open, tried to sit up straight and locate the source of the sound, but a day of struggle, pain, and worry had him wrapped in the sort of sludgy, dragging exhaustion that could not be resisted.

As sleep finally took him, Usopp heard that same feeling- or felt that same sound -but it had more meaning to it now, as if it were words made of the thoughts that birthed words. It was too late for his consciousness- Usopp was sure his body was already asleep and his mind was just floating down into it more slowly than normal -but something in his subconscious mind latched onto those words like a lifeline thrown to a drowning man. They were sad, yes, but comforting as well, and Usopp smiled as he finally fell into sleep completely.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Anyone viewing this from a distance, through a lens, would only see a small, beaten ship floating gently in the unmoving waters of the vast Calm Belt, her lone sailor snoring softly on the deck under a field of shimmering stars. If one were to listen in closely, they would hear nothing but the breathing of the young sailor, and the subtle creak of wood.

Someone with the right awareness, however- something who could hear voices nobody else could, perhaps -would hear something else entirely. Sound that was not sound, thought that was not thought, echoed out in gentle waves from the tiny ship, down into the deep blackness of the water. It was answered, then, by a much larger wave: a tsunami of thought and meaning, almost as vast as the ocean itself.

The water barely displaced, the stillness of the Calm Belts almost unbroken, as _something_ loomed up out of the deep. It was careful, gentle- its cargo was too important, its contents valuable beyond measure, as the young determined one before him had intimated to passionately -as it let the waters flow it, carrying the small ship with them. Her passenger didn't shift from his sleep at all.

 _You're_ my _responsibility... mine..._

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Usopp awoke in darkness.

He blinked several times and reached up to rub his eyes, but the darkness never lessened, and panic quickly chased the last threads of sleep from his mind. He let out a little gasp as he stodd, looking around, but still he saw nothing.

"What... what the hell? Where am I?" Usopp muttered as he felt around with his hands in the darkness. The wood beneath his hands assured him, at least, that he was still on the Going Merry, but he was still confused and terrified. _I haven't gone blind or something, have I?!_ he thought wildly, dropping to his hands and knees to slowly feel his way long the deck. He came to the stairs and realized he was still on the fore deck- memories of sleeping there under the stars rose up to the surface of his mind -and he stood to descend them and then ascend the stairs to the rear deck and the galley. Usopp felt along the wall and found the door, then reached out hesitantly and flicked the light switch.

Relief flooded Usopp's body as the lights came on and he was proven very definitively _not_ blind. It was at this moment, as he sagged against the doorframe and sighed, that usopp finally noticed the smell. He sniffed once deeply and regretted it, as the smell was completely _awful_ , like rotting fish and vomit.

Usopp looked out into the darkness, barely illuminated by the light spilling out of the gally windows and the open door, but he could barely see anything, so he went inside the galley to retrieve a few necessary items. He stuck a clothespin on his nose and stepped out back onto the Merry's deck, lighting his hurricane lantern and holding it up high as he walked to the railing. He could see that there was still water below the Merry, but it was shallow: a very-noticeable bottom could be seen through the water. Usopp could hear the sound of water moving in the darkness, echoing as if in a... huge... cave...

 _Alright, so_ somehow _the Going Merry and I were carried into a cave? In the Calm Belt?_ Usopp thought, horrified. _What did the one freak current in the whole damn belt carry us in here? Damn my luck... I swear, it's like the universe is conspiring against me or something._ He gazed down at the Merry'd deck, worried. _I wonder if she took any damage when we were carried in here, then? I better check..._

The stench of the darkened cavern was overwhelming. The sound of dripping water and a low, undefined rumbling dominated the cavern. Usopp clambered stiffly down the rope ladder and alighted in the water, which came to just below his ankles. The mud under his feet seemed to squish down and then contract again as he walked around the Going Merry, examining her for further damage.

The bow of the ship had a new hole in it, along with an equivalent one on the stern right beside the now snapped rudder, which was holding together just by a few splinters and an old bent tin plate. _I'm gonna have to start ripping up floorboards to make these repairs_ , Usopp despaired, laying his free hand gently against the Merry's side. "Sorry, Merry..." he said aloud, his hoarse voice echoing a little in the cave.

Usopp turned from the Going Merry to stare down the length of the cavern. The flickering light from his lantern didn't reach all that far, but in the dimmest edges of it Usopp could see some dark bulky shapes sitting on the cave floor. Or perhaps they were part of the cave? He glanced at the slowly-shrinking flame inside his lantern and felt a seed of panic settle in is chest. _Can't go wasting oil so much... who knows how long it could take me to get the Merry out of here?_ he thought, then climbed back onto the deck to search his belongings in the galley.

When he'd finally found what he was looking for, Usopp stepped back out onto the deck and extinguished his lantern, plunging the cave back into total blackness. A moment later a ceramic-y _click_ echoed through the cavern, and a pool of light much larger and more consistent than the lantern could produce poured out of the small shell held in Usopp's hand.

 _Dials really are amazing_ , Usopp thought absently as he stowed his lantern and climbed back down to the cave floor. Usopp made his way slowly along the length of the cave, glancing back guiltily at the Going Merry as she was left behind in the dark.

The cave was long and high-ceilinged, and Usopp had to go about a dozen paces to the left before the edge of his light even touched the wall. It took a solid four minutes of walking before the dark shapes looming in the distance revealed themselves. As the light splashed across the nearest colossal form, Usopp's jaw dropped.

The rotting shell of an enormous galleon- bigger than any he'd seen -lay on its side against the wall to his left. It was ancient and decrepit, resembling the ship called Saint Bliss that had fallen from the sky, but even larger; it dwarfed even Don Krieg's massive ship which was destroyed back at Baratie. Its figurehead was in the shape of a hand that had once been holding something, but the last half of it was long missing.

"Whoa..." Usopp gasped, staring at the ship's massive form. He lifted his light dial high and leaned to the side, squinting past the wrecked galleon at the other huge objects further down the cave's length. The light barely touched even the nearest one, but as its silhouette was thrown into sharper relief, Usopp became certain he'd somehow made his way into a ship graveyard.

"This... is not good," Usopp muttered as he turned toward the Merry and walked back. "Who knows how long these ships have been here? Or what... what happened to their crews?!" Usopp swallowed thickly and picked up his speed, each step splashing in the shallow water. As he splashed to a stop right at the Going Merry's rope ladder, he paused for a moment to catch his breath, he noticed a strange hissing noise coming from near his feet. Usopp paused for an instant to look down, and in that short moment a sharp stinging pain alighted on his leg just above his ankle.

"Yowch!" Usopp yelped as he brought his leg up to grasp at the injury. He stared at the small hole that had just appeared in his bandages and the spot of angry red skin encircled within. "What... what the hell is this?" Usopp wondered aloud. A strange suspicion bubbled up into Usopp's mind, and he scrambled up the ladder as quick as he could, then sat down on the deck and took off his shoes, carefully.

The water on his shoes smelled strongly of something sharp and acidic; Usopp was reminded of the smell of the men's quarters the time he'd vomited in his sleep and woke up to Sanji and Zoro complaining about the smell, while Luffy snored onward undaunted and Chopper asked him how he was feeling. Usopp was surprised to realize that his memory wasn't as painful to think about. _Maybe I'm just becoming numb,_ he considered absently as he looked at the strange little pockmarks that had shown up on the edges of his shoes. They smelled just as acrid as the water, with an additional scent of burning leather mixed in. Cautiously, Usopp ran his finger down the wet sole of his shoe and stared as the bandages on his fingertip began to slowly dissolve.

"Crap, crap!" Usopp muttered as he hurriedly wiped his finger on his overalls, wincing as the sting slowly faded. He tried his best to keep his cool- god, did he try -but dread slowly boiled up from deep in his gut and filled his head with a fog of fear.

"Oh crap, oh man..." Usopp groaned as he stared around at the dripping, rumbling darkness beyond his light dial's reach. "This is joke, right?! It's bad enough that I ended up in a huge cave that just _happens_ to be a ship graveyard, but did all the water in his place have to be full of acid?!"

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Usopp spent several hours alternating between panic and despair as he tried and failed to formulate a plan of action. Every scheme he bounced off the walls of the galley paled in the face of the reality of the situation. How would he move the Going Merry through such shallow water? What could he do against the dissolving power of its acidic nature? He had to get the Merry out of this place as soon as he could; he was certain this corrosive environment ws not doing her any favors. Usopp could just imagine himself finally dragging her out of this cavern, only for her to sink because her hull dissolved away to nothing.

 _I've got to discover the exit to this damn cave first, though_ , Usopp thought to himself during one of his 'despair' moments as he sat on his futon in the galley staring at his acid-marred shoes. _To do that, I need to devise some way to negate the acid, or resist it... but how?_ He got to his feet and started pacing, wheels turning in his head. He stopped back at his futon and crouched to rummage through his satchel until he pulled out what he needed.

After a few moment of simple tinkering, Usopp went out to the railing of the Merry's deck with his new invention in hand: the Usopp Acid-Grabber! Okay, so it was just an old drinking glass tied on the end of some fishing line, but it was exactly the perfect solution to avoid the danger of touching that corrosive acid-water. Usopp lowered the Acid-Grabber into the shallow water and then raised it back up very carefully, full to the brim. He let it drip for a moment before setting the glass down on a cheap ceramic dinnerplate and carrying it inside the galley to where he'd set up his Usopp Factory.

"Alright..." Usopp muttered to himself as he sat down with his prize. "Now to figure out what can stop this water from hurting me... or the Merry." Usopp spent the next hour or so carefully applying tiny drops of the water to anything and everything he could imagine might be able to block the acidic effects, coming up with some interesting but ultimately useless results: baking soda from the pantry made it so the water didn't burn him any more, but there was no way he could dump enough of it in the water to make a difference for him; soap from the bath had a similar if weaker effect, but it wasn't durable enough to protect him from the water; the ceramic plate was of course able to resist the acidic nature of the water very well, but he could hardly cover the Going Merry's hull in dinner plates. Usopp began to get a bit desperate, moving on to trying different things: gunpowder's effect was negligible; alcohol did nothing; a rubber band resisted the acidic water well but just didn't feel particularly secure. Finally, Usopp began to experiment with his own experimental materials and ammo, again hitting dead end after dead end until at last, he hit on something.

Usopp couldn't help but grin as he stared at the not-smoking, not-burning, not-dissolving mass of pink before him. Despite dumping every last bit of the water he'd collected onto it, this new solution did not change, shrink, or steam at all. Usopp had to congratulate himself on devising this: a super-sticky pink goo based on bubblegum but much tougher, which he'd designed for a new Sticky Star he was planning, that also just happened to be completely resistant to the acidic effects of this cavern's water.

It took a little time, but Usopp managed to coat his shoes and his legs up to his knees in sticky pink gloop. It made walking to the ship railing and climbing down the ladder a little difficult, but once he was in the water itself Usopp found that his feet did not stick to the cave floor, as if the water were forming a natural barrier between it and the adhesive. He looked down the length of the dark cavern and swallowed heavily, then began his trek.

 _It's alright, it's fine... I already went this way before, it's fine..._ Usopp's thoughts were repeating this mantra as he wandered into the darkness, the bubble of light provided by his light dial surrounding him as his footsteps splashed in the acidic water. He walked past the first dilapidated ship which he had originally encountered, then passed at least six more on his journey. The darkness seemed to press at the edges of his protective shell of light, growing heavier as he walked farther and farther from the Going Merry.

Usopp's footsteps and the splashing of the corrosive water echoed lightly through the cave as he passed a couple more abandoned wrecks, smaller than the one closest to the Merry's resting place but still larger than the Going Merry herself. Each one seemed a little more ruined than the one before, the hulls that sat in the shallow acidic water more rotted and dissolved from, apparently, longer contact with the water.

 _Perhaps the ships at the back of the cave have been here longer... But why would that be? Unless something is moving them further back... Maybe the current that brought me in here to begin with? But how was there a current at all? I was in the Calm Belt!_ Usopp tried to puzzle through these strange mysteries as he walked, passing a fourth wrecked ship; this one had been split right in half somehow, and looked as though it had been crushed and sliced at the same time. Usopp spotted a single skeletal figure, a dead sailor laying on the rotten deck, and he quickly looked away, swallowing hard.

Beyond this last ship, Usopp couldn't see any other ships resting on the cave floor. He also noticed that he could at last see the cavern's ceiling, and saw that there was a steady downard sweep to it in the direction he was walking. Similarly, the floor seemed to be rising into a vertical angle from this point in the cave, though not as steeply as the ceiling, and the walls were slowly turning inward, as though the cavern were becoming an enormous funnel. The cavern narrowed consistently for a few dozen paces, and as the light fell more and more evenly across the closing walls, Usopp noticed strange striations running horizontally along, as though the cavern had bunched up and was wrinkling. The rock seemed oddly shiny and wet under the light, as though it were polished carefully to bring out a damp glisten in every square inch of stone. _Perhaps by the motion of water, rushing into the cave? That might explain the weird horizontal lines..._

The deep, distant, quiet rumbling that had been a constant noise was louder here near the narrow end of the cave, too, and Usopp wondered about the sound's source. Was there a waterfall all the way at the end, where the acidic water was draining- where the seawater that rushed in from the same anomolous current which had carried the Going Merry into the cave would have gone? The sound wasn't quite the same as Usopp would've expected a waterfall to sound, and if the acidic water sitting in the cave had a current to it, it was so slow and subtle that he couldn't even feel it. _That water had to drain out somehow, unless it's like the tide going out and it all drained out the front entrance... but how have these other ships been brought further into the cave?_

Confusion mounted into dread and panic as Usopp continued. Whereas before Usopp had felt that the vast empty darkness of the cavern proper was unnerving and haunting, he closeness of the walls and ceiling seemed almost sinister, even though the ceiling was still almost his height again above him and the walls had about thrice his armspan between them. Usopp hadn't ever suffered from claustrophobia, but something like it was building in him now as he walked and walked. Usopp stared around himself and above himself as he continued, and was so distracted that he almost pitched forward when the floor suddenly disappeared.

Usopp gave a panicked yelp and windmilled his arms, skittering backwards from the sudden drop in the cavern floor... though it wasn't really a drop, per se, as it was a sudden steep slope, which Usopp saw when he finally corrected himself and prevented falling face first into the (burning acidic evil) water. The slow incline that almost but not quite matched the narrowing of walls and ceiling stopped here, forming a slight lip that stopped the water from running down the slope into darkness.

 _So the water only drains to a point, then?_ Usopp thought, putting his hand on his chin as he considered the lip carefully. _That might explain how the standing water became so acidic. As water rushes in from the sea and leaves behind this standing three or four inches of water, minerals from the rock and silt can leech into the water. I bet there's a lot of sulfur in the stone here, and it bonded in the water with dissolved hydrogen and oxygen gas to form sulfuric acid in low concentrations, and then with the salt from seawater to form hydrochloric acid... yeah. Must be it._ Usopp was honestly impressed with his ability to keep calm and flex his mental faculties in these conditions.

Usopp was so busy thinking about chemistry and congratulating his own acuity that he almost missed the cavern walls flexing.

"Wha... what... the hell?" Usopp muttered as a ripple seemed to run through the stone ( _Stone!? Stone doesn't_ ripple! _What even the_ hell?!) and it flexed inward slowly and then outward again. Out of the darkness beyond the sloping floor rose a cloud of some noxious steam, hot and sulfurous, and Usopp found himself gagging and covering his mouth. With the cloud of steam came a slow, low gurgling rumble of noise. A suspiciously familiar noise. Usopp swallowed past a lump in his throat.

 _That sounded like a... burp._

"Oh shit," Usopp said in a strained whisper. Slowly, carefully, he edged back toward the lip in the floor and the slope beyond it, and leaned over to stare into darkness. Usopp raised his light dial in a shaking hand. The very edge of the light's reach splashed across the very end of the downsloping tunnel, and Usopp almost vomited in terror.

The walls curved inward here and the floor and ceiling met, so that the shape of it was almost circular. The striations that Usopp had noticed before seemed to increase in narrowness and concentration, pinching closed into a tight collection of the odd lines in an irregular, radial pattern. As Usopp watched, the very end of the cavern flexed again, tightening inward before loosening a little again, and more of that hot, foul steam sprayed out of it like a clothes iron. Usopp felt like crying and throwing up at the same time. He backed away slowly, eyes darting around as details and oddities slowly came together in his mind to form a complete picture. A horrifying picture.

Usopp turned and ran, splashing in the acidic water, his arms and legs pumping desperately, ignoring pain and fatigue and the disorienting way the light dial's illumination swung wildly around him as his hand clenched it tightly. He passed the rotting wrecks, ran past the Going Merry, and ran as far as he could, toward the entrance. The walls narrowed here as well, though not nearly as extremely as at the other end, and Usopp almost fell onto his knees in the acid as his light dial lit up the front end.

 _It's almost the same..._ Usopp's mind offered distractedly as he stared at the radial collection of striations, flexing a rippling subtly and randomly. It was much larger, and terminated a slope upwards rather than down, but the structure was otherwise very similar. Usopp gritted his teeth in an effort to keep from screaming and shuffled about in his satchel jerkily. He pulled out a brown leather sheath, worn and beaten, holding a wood-handled knife. Usopp approached the nearest wall and clumsily drew the knife, then reached out toward the wall. He hesitated for a moment, then stabbed.

The knife sank right into what was obviously not at all stone, and Usopp left it there, staring as red liquid welled up around the blade and ran in a trickle down the wall. The understanding, the realization of the horrible truth, hit Usopp like a cannonball to the face. He backed away from the knife as the red liquid- _blood, it's blood, oh god it's_ blood -began to stain the wooden handle, and spread through the water as well in a dark cloud. That rumbling which had dominated the darkness suddenly grew, shifted in pitch and began to echo in Usopp's very bones, and he turned and ran as fast as he could, not caring at all about the acid splashing onto his clothes or his bandages.

 _No... no... no! Why?! Why is this happening?!_ Usopp's reeling mind screamed as he stumbled along the strange soft floor- _of course it's soft and spongey, you idiot!_ -and final arrived back at the Merry. He climbed the rope ladder and collapsed onto the deck, panting and gasping for the stinking, acrid air. The light dial rolled away from him and clattered against the wall of the weapon storage room, but Usopp couldn't bring himself to care. Instead he curled into himself, drawing his knees to his chest and gripping his shoulders with his arms crossed, and his whole body shivered uncontrollably.

 _I'm not in a cave... it's not a cave..._ Tears welled up in Usopp's horrified eyes as the light dial finally stopped rolling and fell over onto its bottom. The small trigger on the shell's back pressed against the deck with a small _click_ that echoed through the air, and it turned off, plunging everything into total darkness. Usopp couldn't hold back the terror and despair any longer, and he let out a pained sob.

 _I'm inside... inside..._

"Merry... I'm sorry..." he muttered thickly through his tears. His voice echoed in the darkness, drowned out by the rumbling sound, which Usopp suddenly recognized. It was slow, so much more agonizingly slow than he would expect, but as he lay there he felt like the worst sort of fool for not realizing it sooner.

It was a heartbeat.

 _I'm in a sea king's stomach._


	4. Losing Days

Woah, has it been a while or what?! This past year has been a slog for me, but I'm back in the saddle and writing as much as I can, as fast as I can!

After all, is there anything more quintessentially 'fanfiction writer' than taking a year-long unannounced hiatus?

Anyway, this is my first chapter in a year, and it's chapter 4! The title of this chapter was taken from the song "Losing Days" by Frank Turner. The tone's a little more upbeat than I'd like for the subject matter, but its lyrics reflect my feelings strongly, both about this story and my own struggles with growing up and becoming something resembling an adult. I'd suggest you listen to it after you read the chapter.

* * *

 _These days I'm collecting scars that don't seem to fade_

 _Cuts and bruises that won't go away_

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

After the first night, Usopp figured that he'd acclimated to the acidic stench and the staleness in the air. It was a small relief to be able to remove the constricting clothespin stuck over his nose, and in the face of his inevitable death, Usopp needed all the little victories he could muster.

With the clock in the galley having been shattered against the floor by the storm-tossed tides while Usopp was passed out the day before, it was difficult to keep track of the hours in the oppressive darkness. Time seemed to swim in and out of Usopp's awareness. At some moments it was flung into sharp relief; the first night after realizing the horrible truth of his predicament, Usopp spent almost three hours lying on the galley floor (trying to sleep with all the lights on because when he tried turning them off he suddenly couldn't get enough air into his lungs), staring at the wall and counting the seconds as they ticked along, each moment agonizing. Other times, hours would fly by without his notice at all (he spent much of the day drifting in and out of bouts of despair and panic as he sat listlessly in the galley or the gun deck, or while pacing deliberately along the deck with his light dial held high in a shaking hand – he'd made his decision to conserve his lantern oil after a disastrous attempt to charge the lights with the water-drawing machine left him gasping in pain), and he was never certain whether he was actually sleeping or just passing out from the weight of despair on his mind. It was a constant weight, like a cannonball chained to his neck, and distraction was the only thing that kept it from snapping his spine.

Distraction, perhaps unsurprisingly, was rather difficult to find in the stomach of a primordial leviathan from the black depths of the abyss. Instead, Usopp resolved himself after a few hours of terrified weeping to make his own distractions. There were still a number of things worth his time and effort, things that would aid him when he finally escaped his prison. And he _would_ escape, he had to believe that to be true; otherwise, Usopp knew he would spiral into a hell from which there would be no return. He'd lose his mind and die in this monster's gut, and the Going Merry along with him.

The Merry was the one solid thing he could cling to in this environment, where time and sunlight had abandoned him. Usopp spent his first day after learning the truth making an expedition to the nearest of the long-wrecked galleons that sat decaying in the darkness. He climbed aboard the leaning deck of the decrepit ship with the assistance of his grappling belt (a climb that was pure torture on his still-injured body) and examined each and every plank to determine which ones were in the best condition, and might be salvaged for the Merry's sake.

It was a more difficult task than Usopp had anticipated, even taking his physical infirmity into account. More than a few times he would spend several minutes examining a promising-looking board for any obvious flaws and hidden deficiencies and find none, but as soon as he attempted to remove the nails and rip the board up the wood would turn to pulpy jelly in his hands, having slowly leeched the stomach acid up into itself through the pores in the wood. After hours of searching and even a brief foray down into the bowels of the rotting vessel (which was aborted when he found that the hallways had been even more badly affected by the acid and would give way with only the slightest touch) Usopp only turned up about a dozen usable boards. Judging by the brief glances of them as he'd wandered past, the other ships in this beast's belly had been sitting in the acid even longer; it wouldn't be worth the effort to even walk to them and look.

Regardless of the dearth of reliable supplies, Usopp was determined to repair as much of the damage the Going Merry had accumulated since leaving Bardigras as he could manage. True to his original diagnosis he had to rip up few boards from the Merry herself to repair the punctures and gaping seams that peppered her hull anew, as much as it pained him to inflict more damage upon her. He made sure to take the planks only from the less-frequented parts of the ship, like the corners of the storeroom that had until recently been covered with crates of various supplies. The repairs were slow-going, and Usopp still wasn't certain how to address the problem of the Merry's contact with the acid (he wasn't sure he had enough supplies to make enough Sticky Stars to cover the entire hull, or even the lowest quarter of it for that matter) but he threw himself into his work nonetheless, fixing as much as he could until his body just couldn't take it anymore.

It was Usopp's injuries that forced him to stop, finally, halfway through repairing the Merry's cracked rudder. He'd reached up to pound in the last nail on his third board along the rudder when a bolt of fierce pain had lanced up his chest and a warm, wet stickiness began to run down his right side. Usopp had gasped in pain and pressed his free hand against his ribs, and it came away stained in a dull red, turned almost brown by the dim light coming from his light dial. After climbing back onto the deck Usopp unwrapped his newly-bloodstained bandages and stared at his side: a wound he'd attained during his failed raid on the Franky House, which had been close to fully healing, was suddenly pouring blood past its stitches ( _stitches that Chopper had put in oh so carefully, he was a wonderful doctor how could this happen- SHUT UP GODDAMMIT_ ) along with some odd, yellowish substance and the skin around it was red and hot. An infection had set in.

Usopp spent that second night in hell carefully unwrapping all of his bandages in the relative safety of the galley (with the lights turned on to both charge the light dial and keep his fraying determination from finally unraveling) so that he could examine all his wounds. What he found was truly horrible: for every wound that had healed properly, there were at least two others that had somehow become infected, even though Usopp knew for certain that they'd been close to healing when he changed his bandages before setting off from Bardigras. The medical supplies he had been... been left, were starting to run low. If he had any anti-infection creams or poultices at all, he'd be damn shocked. Usopp had almost cried himself to sleep that night (or at least what he thought was night, he was increasingly less and less sure) thinking that it would be the height of the universe fucking with him if he were to escape this damn sea king's stomach only to die of an infection or nine.

Of course, it was just as likely that he would die of starvation first. That same night, after he'd tried his best to wash his infected wounds with as little of his clean water supply as possible and rewrapped the bandages that covered eighty percent of his body, Usopp went to retrieve some cheese from the Merry's refrigerator and gagged at the smell when he opened the door. It turned out that somehow, during the panic of the past couple days, he'd failed to notice the electrical connection to the fridge had been severed and its door propped open by a jammed shelf, and the scant amount of perishable food he had left was rotting. This was especially shocking because, at least in Usopp's experience, two days in ambient temperatures lower than sixty degrees on average was hardly long enough for all that good food to have spoiled so disgustingly thoroughly.

Usopp was struck with yet another dreadful suspicion as he went to examine his dry food stores and non-perishables and discovered that they, too, had begun rotting with alarming speed. A spiderweb of evidence mapped itself out in his brain, connecting the slow rotting of the wrecked ships' wood, the strange regress in his wounds' healing process and the mysterious infections, and the rapid spoilage of any exposed foodstuffs. Usopp was no biologist- his self-taught aptitude for chemistry was the extent of his scientific knowledge in general -so he couldn't say for certain if this was likely or even possible, but a theory built itself upon the foundation of his deepest fears. Somehow, the very air inside this monstrous gut was rotting organic matter, while simultaneously preserving its structure. Some enzyme or airborne bacterium was causing wounds to stop healing and food to spoil, while the structure of the ships trapped inside was mostly unaffected, at least until something jostled them. It was like this environment was designed to kill the beast's prey, but slowly, and to keep them alive while they failed to heal from their injuries. Such a titanic creature probably required its food to last it a long time between meals, but it'd be no good if something swallowed whole regained its strength and ripped its way out of the monster's innards.

So Usopp's dreams that night were even more haunted by the fear of death than they usually were, if that was even possible. Every moment he spent inside the sea king was like a racheting meter ticking down to inevitable doom, and Usopp could feel the _clack-clack-clack_ of this invisible, ineffable machine rattling inside his very soul.

He might have felt the tiny hand that rested upon his own, or it might have been part of the dream.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

When he awoke to his third morning in hell, Usopp was even more exhausted than when he'd gone to bed, but his mind was echoing with intrusive fear and he knew any more sleep was a pipe dream. He groaned as he sat up from his pallet, rubbing his eyes and glaring at the lights in the galley ( _were they getting dimmer as they came closer to burning out or was his vision just failing after working in low light so much; hard to imagine which would be worse_ ) then continued to grumble almost loud enough to drown out the growling of his empty stomach as he stood and walked out onto the Going Merry's deck. Usopp stood there for a moment, surveying the distant darkness with a sort of distracted hate as he tried to parse out exactly how the hell he was going to survive _starvation_ on top of everything else, when the constant pulsing, low rumble of the sea king's heartbeat was joined by another sound that echoed through its guts. Usopp leaned against the Merry's railing and listened, but he was unable to place the noise. Then a gentle splash rose up from over the side of the ship, and Usopp felt his heart skip a beat. He fumbled in his overalls for his light dial and gave a hoarse little shriek as he nearly dropped it in the water, and when he finally clicked that little trigger and peered over the edge of the railing, Usopp's heart skipped about six more beats in a row.

All his time in his fleshy prison, Usopp had never seen the water in this monster's gut move more than a gentle rippling unless he himself was splashing in it. Now, staring down at the black surface of the acidic hell-water, he saw what appeared to be a gentle wake running up against the side of the Going Merry's hull that faced the sea king's throat, and the wake seemed to be growing in intensity by the second. Usopp tore his gaze away from the rolling water to look ahead toward the front end of the stomach, peering into darkness and panting fearfully. Hope and dread danced arm-in-arm in his head as he shifted his eyes about, trying to pick out some detail from the black air before him. A slow, low, _squelch_ -ing sound echoed from up near the gullet of the leviathan, distorted by the distance, and Usopp gripped the Merry's railing and braced himself.

If the water had been moving in a gently-rising wake before, it was flowing like a powerful river now; the water kept coming and coming, its level rising steadily up from the bare six inches of standing acid it had been for the past two days of Usopp's entrapment. Usopp gaped at the sudden rushing torrent that now flowed past the Going Merry's hull. He nearly lost his footing as a creaking wooden groan clawed its way out of the Merry and into his ears, and the deck beneath him- which had been cocked slightly to starboard since the ship had settled into its position -began shifting to become more level.

 _What is going_ on _here?_ Usopp wondered as he ground his teeth, trying to force his tired, hungry brain to put two and two together. He glanced up to the fore deck, staring at the Merry's figurehead, and realization finally struck him like a brick between the eyes. _The sea king... it's..._

"It's swallowing water... drinking it?" Usopp muttered to himself. In different circumstances he would have winced at just how scratchy his voice was, but he had more prominent concerns. Foremost of which was the fact that the air in his personal hellhole, nightmarishly stagnant under regular conditions, had begun blowing gently against him. It would make sense that the beast was taking in some air with the water if it were a land-dwelling, air-breathing creature, but from what little Usopp knew of biology, most sea kings breathed water.

It also didn't make sense that the air was blowing from _behind_ him, rather than from where the water was actually entering.

Usopp almost smacked himself when his comprehension caught up with reality, and he scrambled down the stairs and then up again onto the fore deck, gripping the anchor that was hooked over the Going Merry's port side railing, and heaving with all his measly might until the curved hunk of steel unsnagged from the wood and plummeted to splash loudly into the water below. For a frightful second it seemed like the anchor wouldn't catch anywhere on the squishy bottom, but as the Merry was carried further along the water's path the rope drew taut, until finally the deck lurched beneath Usopp's feet and he stumbled against the railing, panting as he watched the rope strain but hold firmly.

Usopp sighed, some of the tension leaking out of his sore back and shoulders. The water continued to rush around the sides of the hull, and as he stood and watched Usopp noticed debris being carried along by the current. Pieces of shattered wood passed by the hull of the Going Merry, bouncing off against its sides gently as the water pulled them along. They started small, single planks and splintered bits, but the pieces seemed get larger an more frequent as Usopp watched. Also in the water with the shattered wood, though difficult to see against the water's reflective surface, were streaks of wispy red; blood was flowing into the sea king's belly with the water and the debris.

Anxious, Usopp fumbled in his pocket for a moment for his light dial, turning it back on and holding it out to try and spy what was going on near the front entrance of this gastric hellhole through his goggles. Just as he managed to focus on the very edge of his dial's range, a great, keening roar echoed through the air, and Usopp jumped about three feet straight in the air and nearly dropped the dial to boot. He took a couple deep breaths to refocus and attempt to calm his pounding heart, glancing back up toward the sea king's throat just in time to watch an enormous object being carried toward the Going Merry on the slowly-ebbing tide of swallowed water. As it came closer the massive silhouette seemed to split into two oddly-shaped halves, and Usopp bore witness to the source of all the ruckus, and the sight of it made his knees buckle and drop him to sit on the deck.

Groaning almost pitifully, a leathery-skinned, serpentine sea-beast drifted into and then out of the light dial's diameter of illumination. On the sea-beast's side Usopp saw one enormous, bloody gash, surrounded by several smaller bleeding wounds; though smallness in this case was very relative, as judging from its distance the smallest wounds visible on the creature's hide were as wide around as Usopp's thigh was thick. The sea-beast's yellow eyes were dull with pain and yet widened in terror and rage, but it was obviously weakened to the point that all it could do was make noise. It drifted away from Usopp's range of clear vision, but not nearly out of earshot, and Usopp heard the groaning crash of the beast settling roughly against one of the nearest rotted galleons further into the sea king's stomach. It let out a pained roar followed by further groaning cries from its resting place in the darkness.

Not long behind the sea-beast, drifting in much closer to the Going Merry than Usopp was strictly comfortable with was a battle-damaged ship, listing but staying just barely upright on the gentle tide of the water the sea king had swallowed. It was three-masted and fairly large, though not a galleon or warship by any means, and had more damage than any ship Usopp had ever laid eyes on barring Don Krieg's dismantled flagship. Gaps, holes, torn out panels and boards, an entire section of railing and fore deck torn out with obvious toothmarks around its absence, and the foremast was snapped, resting along the length of the deck.

The wrecked ship groaned and creaked almost as loudly as the roaring sea-beast, settling onto the floor of the sea king's stomach not ten feet from the Going Merry's hull. As the water receded and the doomed sea-beast lay in the distant darkness, Usopp sat dumbfounded on the fore deck of the Merry, blinking up at the shadowed rigging and swaying, tattered sails. He climbed unsteadily to his feet, jerking in mild shock as something heavy and humanoid dislodged from somewhere in this ruined ship's upper rigging and fell through the darkness, landing with a wet thump somewhere on the part of the wreck's deck that Usopp couldn't see.

 _Jeez… I think I can tell what happened here_ , Usopp thought grimly, eyeing the gaping holes in the hull of the wreck, along with the spot near the stern where the ship had been split almost in half rather messily. _Judging by their relative sizes, these smaller holes are from that sea-beast… and that big spot that finally did her in was from the teeth of this sea king. It probably caught them tired out from fighting, and decided to take an easy two-for-one meal._ He shuddered a little at the thought of what the teeth of something this primordially enormous must look like; he'd seen Laboon's teeth from not too far away, massive cones of enamel that they were, and judging from stomach sizes alone this sea king was more than twice the big friendly (terrifying) whale's size.

Usopp sighed a little, dread and hunger creeping back in now that his adrenaline was draining away. The momentary excitement of this wrecked ship being newly consumed by this tremendous leviathan had offered him a welcome distraction, but now he was back where he started. The twin problems of infection and starvation still hung over his head, and a random ship being engulfed by the same hell in which he'd been imprisoned was... not... helping...

Obviously hunger, pain, and exhaustion had taken a heavy toll on Usopp's mental faculties, because it took him a solid ten minutes of standing and staring at the settling ship resting in the acidic water near enough from the Going Merry to poke with a stick to finally put two and two together and make a decision. For the first time during his stay inside the sea king Usopp felt a spark of hope flare into being in his chest, and he limped off as quickly as he could to prepare.

About a half hour of frantic labor was all it took to complete his plan. Usopp had a slightly manic smile on his lips as he gazed upon the lashed-together gangplank he'd put together from some of the salvaged boards he'd yet to use in the Merry's repairs. It rested upon the fore deck of his ship, supported by a few more boards and poles to help with its stability as it extended the twenty feet diagonal climb from the Going Merry to the wrecked ship's railing. Usopp nearly slipped off the rickety thing three times during his ascent toward his new jackpot, but he was so focused on his prize he hardly noticed.

At another time the prospect of stealing supplied from dead men on a ruined ship would have driven fear and moral apprehension into Usopp's soul, but he was well beyond desperate at this point. In the back of his mind he told himself he'd give a little prayer and an offering in the unknown crew's name at whatever altar, shrine, or church he came across after escaping, a thought which soothed his remaining worries regarding desecration of the dead as he clambered over the railing and alighted upon the unfamiliar deck.

The first thing Usopp noticed upon hitting the deckboards was the dead bodies. A dozen dead men lay scatted across the ship, and blood soaked the wood of the planks as thoroughly as sea water. Several more had settled in the rigging, revealed by the very top of the dome of light cast by Usopp's light dial, bleeding corpses all, dripping and swaying with the residual motion of the ship's consumption. Usopp swallowed back bile into his empty stomach and forcefully put the thought out of his mind, favoring his task over anything else. He'd seen people die before; he wasn't about to be sent running away now.

Usopp proceeded to explore the ship, finding the galley and storage areas quickly, and taking a look in the cabins and quarters as well. Most of the contents of the quarters had been scattered or upturned by the ship's violent confrontation with the sea-beast and its equally violent confrontation with the sea-king's teeth. This ship seemed to have been a merchant ship of some sort, carrying crates upon crates of a dozen different trade goods- leathers, wool, jars and bottles of things Usopp didn't recognize immediately -and stocked for a month or so's voyage. Dried meats and even dehydrated fruits sat in abundant sacks and barrels in the pantry, so numerous Usopp nearly cried: if these kept, he at least might not starve, and might be able to regain some of his strength. The galley still had power running to it from the acid batteries in the ship's bilge, the same as the ones that ran the Going Merry's electrical lights and refrigerator, so the one likewise in the wrecked ship's galley was still running despite having been knocked about a bit in the chaos.

Slowly but surely Usopp moved supplies one barrel or crate at a time from the ruined ship to his beloved Merry, from dry goods to sealed fresh water barrels to a couple crates containing bottles of cheap rum, along with as much good lumber, rope, tar, pitch, and nails as he could move. It was exhausting, painful labor, and the little ladder-esque bridge Usopp had built creaked ominously under the weight of him carrying the various supplies across it, but it held still, and after a couple hours' work the storage rooms and galley of the Merry were all but filled. During all this time, the slow rhythmic rumble of the sea king's pulse was drowned out by Usopp's own labored breathing- and by the still-echoing moans of the sea-beast that lay dying in the darkness, but Usopp tried not to concentrate on that as he worked.

The real boon to Usopp's predicament came in the form of the contents of the bottles and jars the merchant vessel had been shipping: each one was labelled with rather obscure wording that rather went over Usopp's head, but he recognized some as identical to a couple of the jars of balms and anti-infection concoctions he'd been left by... well, he grabbed every crate of the recognizable medications available, along with the bandages and denatured alcohol present in the ship's doctor's (former) quarters, which was well stocked and organized despite looking like a storm had blown through it earlier that day. With these supplies in hand, Usopp was hopeful ( _hopeful, by god; the thought that there might be something for him other than death in this place, that this might not be the end for him and the Merry, was now so alien to him it filled him with a manic glee_ ) that the infections and the rotting-yet-preserving effects of the environment in this giant creature's stomach might still be staved off, if only for a while. It still might be enough time. He even found some of the necessary components for making more of his Sticky Star compound, amazingly.

Of course, the hope and joy that had suddenly flared to life in Usopp's heart was fragile, built as it was on the fatal misfortune of over a dozen strangers and whoever was financing this doomed ship's final voyage, so he shouldn't have been surprised when fate decided to steal the wind out of his sails and remind him of the palpable reality of his imprisonment. After a short rest and a quick meal of dried meats and fruits Usopp dove right back into the process of loading as much as possible onto the Going Merry. He was just heading back toward a section near the front of the ruined ship he'd yet to explore, adrenaline and hope still keeping him going despite his tiredness and aching body, when a noise caught his ear.

It was desperately quiet, so faint Usopp wouldn't have even noticed if it hadn't come suddenly during a brief lull in the groans of the dying sea beast, in between his own breaths, and on the downbeat of the sea-king's slow, rumbling heartbeat, but hear it he did. A whispered word, a voice so distant and low it might not have even been a sound in the air so much as a feeling in the back of Usopp's mind.

 _"Please..."_

The shock of hearing a voice other than his own after a few days of isolation snapped and sparked through him like lightning. Usopp gasped and jolted to the side, the pain of a strained muscle ricocheting up his legs and into his lower back and sending him onto his ass, his light dial popping from his pocket and rolling onto the deck. With a panicked squawk Usopp barely managed to grab his precious source of light and fumble to click it and turn it on, illuminating a portion of the deck not touched by the ship's own galley lights or the Merry's. He sat there, breathing heavily for moment as he waited for the other shoe to drop, but the noise didn't repeat.

That is, it waited until Usopp had found his feet again, winding its way out of the shadows at the edge of the dial's range to crawl into his ears, sending a chill flooding down his back.

 _"Please... no..."_

"W-w-who's t-there?!" Usopp managed to rasp fearfully, trained eyes darting rapidly along the edge of his bubble of light. He saw nothing at first, just the impenetrable gray-black of darkness just outside his sanctuary of light, but at the corner of his vision, something shifted. Usopp whirled to face the movement, unsteadily standing as his knees knocked and his pulse pounded. In the shadows another subtle shift came, along with the soft rustle of cloth and a murmured groan, nearly drowned out by the sea-beast's own. Swallowing heavily around the nausea in his throat Usopp took one slow, deliberate step forward, the edge of his field of light moving with him, revealing the source of the noise.

It seemed for a moment to be yet another dead sailor. The sallow-faced man's once white shirt was stained dark with his own blood, a shard of shattered railing emerging from his stomach near his left hip the source of most of it. Lank brown hair had come out of a tie at the back of his head and was splayed across the deck, laying in yet another pool of blood. Usopp stared for a moment, pondering the sight, and he swallowed thickly again as he noted the uneven motion of the man's chest, slow and stuttering.

On a dead ship full of dead men, Usopp had come across the one living sailor left. He also happened to be the first living person Usopp had seen in days, though judging from his wounds he might not be long for that vital condition. A dark, sour part of Usopp's mind surfaced and told him just the keep going, pass by as if he'd seen nothing. The man was just as dead as his comrades, breathing or not, and it would be best for the both of them if Usopp left the man to die with his crew. It was tempting, and a rational choice, certainly; tired Usopp may have been, but he had enough of his wits about him to reason that abandoning the man for dead would do him the most good, and perhaps do the dying man the most as well.

Why Usopp gritted his teeth, set down his light dial gently on the deck, and strode forward to kneel at the sailor's side and begin looking him over, he could not explain with logic. Why he made the perilous trip across his flimsy bridge twice more to fetch medical supplies, he could not express rationally. Usopp's knowledge of medicine was amateur at best, but he knew at least that exposed wood was a haven for infectious elements, and wounds to the gut were a bad, slow way to die. Carefully, Usopp removed the man's torn and stained shirt to examine the wound, seeing that the spike of wood had pierced a good five inches into his belly.

Usopp had never stitched a wound before, but he knew how to sew. He used the galley stove to burn clean his sharpest needle and dipped some sturdy thread in a bowl of denatured alcohol, then removed the offending piece of railing from the dying man and stitched up the wound with inexpert urgency. Of course the man lost blood quickly during the process, but his heart still beat below Usopp's fingers, erratic and weak but still not dead. An application of some disinfectant and bandages and Usopp sat back, exhaustion gripping him as he came down from the adrenaline high for what seemed like the third time that day (or whatever passed for day). He let his eyes drift closed as he sat by his unlikely patient, the scent of the gastric environment for once almost drowned out by the smell of blood and disinfectant.

Beneath the pervasive rumbling sound of the sea king's lethargic heartbeat and the ever more infrequent groaning of the dying sea-beast, a tiny, breathy voice reached Usopp's ear. He looked down at the injured sailor, and the weak subtle movements of the man's stubbled jaw matched the nigh-imperceptible words tickling Usopp's eardrums.

"Ursa... please..." mumbled the bloodied man, his face screwed up in an expression of pain and fear. Weakly the sailor began to shift, his limbs flailing sluggishly as he whimpered. Usopp grimaced and moved to kneel by the sailor's side. He grabbed a bottle of rum he'd retrieved from among his reclaimed supplies and placed it gently as he could against the man's mouth, using his other hand to lift his head and keep it still. Instinctively the sailor reacted to the slow trickle of liquid, drinking slowly and coughing for just a moment at the burn of alcohol before swallowing more of the strong drink.

"Might not be a good idea to give an injured man booze... but hell, it worked for.. urgh," Usopp clenched his jaw at the pang of loss that shot through him as his muttered musings took an unwelcome turn. He shook his head against the thought; exhaustion was weakening his resolve, but he had enough distractions to keep him functioning in the form of the unconscious man laid before him, his restless motions ceasing as his breathing evened out a little more and his heartbeat, though still unsteady, became less erratic. Usopp sighed and set down the now mostly-empty bottle after having a couple bracing swigs himself, watching the twitching movements of the sailor slowing as he drifted further into unconsciousness. In the darkness, the dying sea-beast groaned again.

 _Damn... This was probably a bad idea._

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

 _Yep, definitely a bad idea,_ Usopp thought to himself as he sat on the floor of the Merry's galley, categorizing all his aches and pains as his patient lay mumbling in unsteady sleep on what had been Usopp's pallet.

The decision to move the injured man to the deck of the Going Merry came about after a pulley that had once been part of the ruined ship's rigging had come loose, smashing into the deck a mere foot from Usopp's head. It was as unsubtle a sign as any Usopp had seen, but it was effective. The sheer difficulty of moving a limp, heavy, injured human being several dozen feet without aggravating said injury had sent him reeling, and after getting the sailor situated on the pallet Usopp had sat his ass down on the floor and groaned as his entire body reminded him, in vivid detail, of every injury he'd sustained in the past few days.

Still, idleness was one of the many things Usopp was trying desperately to avoid, so rather than spend several hours pitying himself (as tempting as that was) he decided to put his newly-acquired supplies to good use. The laundry list of tasks which might offer some further distraction and a veneer of accomplishment to dull the horror of his situation and the uncertainty of the fate of the injured man this sea king's predations had tossed unceremoniously into his lap was just as tempting to Usopp, so he got to it. He reexamined the electrical work in the galley, making sure that the fridge was cleaned of its former rotting contents thoroughly and that the seals on the doors were as close to airtight as he could manage, then transplanted the perishable goods from the other ship's galley refrigerator into the Going Merry's. He wasn't sure exactly how the effects of the sea king's stomach actually worked, but he hoped it was an airborne element that a good hermetic seal and temperatures just above freezing could keep at bay. After doing this Usopp spent some time tinkering with ideas on how to keep the Merry's batteries charged when he was too injured to run the usual machines and hesitant to get acidic water into the ship's pipes for the bargain, but he didn't make much progress. This was worrying, but he knew that the Going Merry could go over two weeks without a charge if he kept the power usage to just the essentials like the fridge and the lights in the galley, so he felt he could address it later.

The urge to get back to work on repairing the damage to the Merry was strong, but Usopp's body was a patchwork of injuries and aches, and he forced himself to put that task aside. In the meantime, he set up his Usopp Factory and began the process of producing as much of his Sticky Star compound as possible. It took about one pellet's worth to coat one shoe, and to try and coat the bottom and even a little of the hull of the Going Merry would take hundreds of them, so that work took a couple hours on its own. Sitting still for so long hunched over his beakers and flasks was still hard on his injuries, but he plowed on regardless.

An hour into making Sticky Stars Usopp's stomach had grumbled especially loudly, so he'd abandoned his chemistry to make both himself and his guest a bite to eat. Usopp was at least adequate at cooking, and he figured a light broth would be easier for the injured man to take, so Usopp prepared a simple broth from some powdered stock base and some of the precious fresh veggies and meat he'd procured from the other ship. Usopp himself enjoyed the bulk of the meat and vegetables (definitely boring and basic, but miles better than the diet of dried meat, biscuits, and occasional fruit he'd survived on for days) while giving the broth to his patient in short sips. Usopp hoped it was a sign of the man's improvement that he reacted by drinking what was offered rather than choking obliviously, but he'd yet to regain consciousness or say anything more complete or coherent than his first mutterings.

As he ate his own dinner Usopp tried to calculate how many hours he'd been awake and active at that point. A working clock had, unfortunately not been among items looted from the wreck, and judging based only on how exhausted he was didn't seem reliable. He could've been up for six hours or sixteen hours, with all the frantic running back and forth carrying heavy cargo to the Merry being a bit of a blur in his mind. Regardless, Usopp was willing to consider this the end of his third 'day' in digestive hell, and at the end of a day of the most intense physical activity since leaving the open sea and sky behind he was really feeling the effects. A hot meal in his belly helped, but only barely.

Thus Usopp found himself sitting on the galley floor, stripped to his waist and carefully reaching behind himself to apply an antibiotic cream to one of the near fever-hot wounds on his back. He'd taken off most of his bandages, worried about soiling his wounds further with possibly unclean linen. The worst of his deep bruises had healed far better than even the lightest scrape or cut, so he left those alone and treated his infections first.

As Usopp sat there and tried to reach the center of his back in that equilibrium between straining and not straining that would put the least stress on his stitches, he was startled by a sudden moan issuing out from between the gritted teeth of his unconscious guest. He turned his head slowly to look in the injured man's direction just in time to watch a bubble of blood gurgle up at the corner of his mouth, his weathered face screwed up in an expression of agony. Usopp let out a hoarse yelp and abandoned his task, scrambling over to the man's side and tossing the blanket away.

Great red stains greeted Usopp, spreading steadily across the bandages on the sailor's stomach; his hands were fisted in the material of the pallet, and his back arched slightly as the blood soaked through the bandages and began to drip gently onto the cloth below. Usopp cursed, panicked, and grabbed the sailor's bandages, stripping them away as gently as he could given the circumstances. With those out of the way he could see that the impromptu stitches he devised had come loose and the reopened wound was bleeding profusely again, and he growled in frustration and fear at the sight. All thoughts of his own wounds abandoned, Usopp snatched up the painkillers and antibiotic creams and set about trying to soothe the wound a little. The sailor's pain-induced tension made stitching the wound up again unrealistic, so Usopp just applied as much of the mild anesthetic as he could to the injury, not certain of how much to use but trying to remember what he'd seen Ch- what he seen _used_ _before_ on Z- on _men of similar bodyweight._

After a moment the anesthetic seemed to take effect and some of the tension bled out of the sailor and he collapsed down against the pallet, breathing heavily. Usopp was breathing almost as heavily, and his limbs felt like lead weights as his body flushed out adrenaline for the who knew what time in the past 'day'. The exhaustion hit him so hard in that moment that he almost missed the words spoken right in front of him.

"Ursa... the captain... I never meant... leave..." muttered the injured man, and Usopp swallowed heavily around his parched throat. For the first time the sailor's eyelids were fluttering, his eyes rolling behind them. Slowly they cracked open and glanced blindly, wildly around until they finally settled on Usopp's face, and he bit back a gasp. The man's expression was one of confusion, and he swallowed thickly and licked his lips before speaking again. "Captain... is that you...?"

Usopp froze, staring into the bleary eyes of the sailor in front of him, and he tried to respond. _Tell him. He has to know. Or does he? If I were... if I were him, injured, alone, I'd want to believe my c-cre... m-my..._ Try as he might, Usopp could not bring himself to speak. The sailor's pain-fogged gaze wavered slightly at Usopp's silence.

"Captain... I wanted to tell you... Ursa says I have to leave... have to leave the crew, have to stay..." the sailor said before he ran out of breath, and he lay there for a moment gasping shallowly before continuing. "Cap'n... 'm gonna... be a father... a boy, Ursa's havin' a boy... I dunno 'f I can..." The man's arm shifted a little and he reached toward his right pants pocket, his fingers clumsily venturing inward as he grabbed some object therein. Usopp was still reeling a little, light-headed from panic and uncertainty, but he knew he'd checked the man's pockets before laying him down on the pallet, if only to make sure the hapless unconscious man wouldn't impale his thigh with a stowed pocket knife or something. The sailor hadn't been carrying anything.

Usopp's patient pulled his hand free from his pocket, slowly, and in his weak grasp was a piece of gold-hued metal, rounded and flat, with a thin chain hanging off one end. Usopp looked at the object uncomprehending. _A locket? How'd I miss that?_ The sailor paid his unwitting caretaker's confusion no mind as he lifted his hand unsteadily up to his face and met it with his left, using his fingernails to open the little hinged item. He stared at it, blinking as his eyes focused, and Usopp watched as tears welled up in the man's eyes and rolled across his face.

"I hafta... I have... t' be here f'her... Cap... you un'rstan... dontcha...?" Usopp bit his bottom lip and watched as the man's eyelids slowly drifted shut and he fell unconscious once again. The locket dropped from nerveless fingers and fell open upon the pillow next to the sailor's head, and Usopp looked down at it. Nestled in the safety of the locket was a tiny photograph, seemingly trimmed out of a larger one; in it a smiling young fair-haired woman with bright blue eyes held a sleeping infant with hair the same shade of brown as the injured man.

For a moment Usopp just traced the lines of their faces in the picture with his eyes, feeling a dense sort of sorrow collecting on his shoulders to take up residence with his exhaustion in the task of weighing him down. Then he sighed and prepared another batch of surgical thread, cautiously and carefully sewing it up the reopened wound, watching all the while for a twitch or gasp of pain that would indicate his patient reawakening from his exhausted slumber. Usopp then took the bandages and wrapped the man's abdomen as tightly as he could with as many layers as he could manage.

The man was out cold again, his breath still shallow and his heartbeat still weak, and Usopp could only hope he'd stay that way until... _Until what? Until he heals? Until we escape? Until a hole in the goddamn fabric of reality opens up under our asses and drops us into an emergency room?!_ Usopp growled and moved to stand, gritting his teeth at the pain of sudden movement as he walked over to the crate of rum he'd salvaged from the wrecked ship. The mostly-empty bottle he'd used to initially soothe his injured guest into unconsciousness sat there waiting, and with a sense of angry finality Usopp popped out the cork and downed the rest of the harsh liquor. Tears burned at the corners of his eyes and he was set into a fit of coughing, the empty bottle dropped forgotten to the floor. As soon as he'd collected himself Usopp was reaching for another bottle, opening it up and drinking another mouthful of rum.

Usopp coughed again and wiped at his watering eyes and nose angrily, staring back at the sleeping sailor with disdain. _He's on my damn pallet... dammit,_ he thought, setting the bottle down on the crate lid and walking out the galley door to head toward the storage room. He emerged a few minutes later with a bundle of sailcloth under his arm, which he dropped onto the other spot on the galley floor that wasn't taken up by crates of plundered supplies. A few minutes' work had shaped the cloth into something of a thin mat that would hopefully be comfortable enough to sleep on.

 _Booze should help with that,_ Usopp thought absently as he set back into his task of applying anti-infection cream to his harder-to-reach wounds, pausing every couple minutes to take another swig of rum. In no time at all Usopp was bandaged up again, sitting on the sailcloth pallet, swaying gently to a tide that wasn't there with a nigh-empty bottle in his hand and his eyes struggling to stay open. His gaze was fixed upon the tiny smear of gold still lying on the sailor's pillow, too far away for his tired drunk eyes to see the details of the picture, but in his mind the blonde woman looked young and paler, with brown eyes, and the baby she held had dark skin and tightly-curled black hair.

A loud noise from outside shook Usopp from his thoughts for a moment. He panicked briefly, unable to place the sound, but a stray neuron in his head must have fired somehow even through the sludge of alcohol and exhaustion because he recognized it just a moment later: the sea-beast was still moaning in pain and fear as it died in its predator's belly. Its cries had grown so infrequent over the past few hours Usopp had nearly forgotten it was there.

Usopp grunted and spat on the floor, then took another swig of rum. As he swallowed a wave of dizziness rolled over him and he fell onto his back, staring at the ceiling in the dim galley lights. Out of the corner of his eye Usopp thought he spotted movement for a moment, but when he turned his head to look there was nothing there. Even the spot where he'd spat on the floor wasn't there, there was so much nothing in that spot.

 _Good,_ Usopp thought blearily, feeling an odd sort of relief. _Sanji would've kicked my ass if he saw me spitting in his kitchen... but he's not here to kick my ass... I wish..._

As he drifted off, the nearly-drained bottle rolling out of his grasp toward the other wall, Usopp thought he might have felt a gentle touch on his forehead, but he was gone into a dreamless sleep too quickly to know for sure if the small hand that rested there was real or not.

 _Guess not..._


	5. Contact

Another long period between chapters, so you all have my apologies. I would've had this done sooner, but I've been dealing with some IRL bullhockey for a while now, so I'm just glad to be done with this one, even if I'm not 100% satisfied with it.

This chapter's title comes from the song "Contact" by As Cities Burn. It's an excellent moody, atmospheric song, and I listened to it before, during, and after writing this dang chapter.

* * *

 _And God, does grace reach to this side of madness?_

 _"Cause I know this can't be the great peace we all seek._

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

The sailor was dead when Usopp woke up.

He'd died sleeping, it seemed, with his hand clutching the dropped locket, but the man was dead indeed. Usopp knelt before the corpse, staring upon the unmoving form with a torrent of unnamed emotion roiling in his sleep-groggy hung-over head. Blood had soaked through the bandages and completely ruined the pallet; the sheer amount of it placed runaway blood loss as a prime candidate for what in fact had killed the man.

 _I must've hit an artery or something when I restitched the wound..._ came the one coherent thought in the fog of Usopp's warring emotions. _It looked like the bleeding had stopped, but I should have checked, should've stayed up to observe him, shoulda..._ A sudden, sourceless rage came gurgling up out of Usopp's gut, edging out some of the bewilderment and synthesizing with the confused sadness to make a steaming hot pot of self-loathing, sitting on the guttering back-burner of the gas stovetop that was his mind at that moment. He stood shakily and turned to look out the open door of the galley, across the Going Merry's deck at the wrecked ship.

 _Alone again..._ Usopp's head throbbed suddenly and he groaned, massaging his right temple with his eyes screwed shut. When he opened them, a flicker of movement caught his attention and he turned again, but the only thing there was the sailor's body and the blood-soaked pallet. Usopp contemplated the corpse absently for a moment, the beginnings of an idea worming their way across his throbbing brain, but its progress was arrested by another spike in his headache.

Usopp's water supply had just recently been replenished- _thanks, poor dead men of the sea_ -so he was not at all hesitant to get a glass and fill it from the sink; he had planned to empty the fresh water barrels he'd looted into the Going Merry's small tank later anyway. _That plan might have to be postponed slightly_ , he thought as he drank and tried to soothe his hangover with a few bites of dried fish that had thankfully refrained from turning rotten over night. That fetal idea had finally taken shape in his head, and Usopp was simultaneously reluctant and absolutely certain it was something he just had to do.

A dead body highlights exactly how heavy and awkward human beings really are when not moving under their own power, especially after it's had a couple hours to progress through rigor mortis. Usopp hefted the dead sailor and his blood-soaked impromptu shroud out the galley and up onto the wreck's deck just the same, huffing and straining the whole way. All told Usopp's new project/self-imposed punishment took what felt like hours of work, climbing and carrying and arranging and wrapping, but finally he'd completed the task placed before him, and he groaned with one hand rubbing his sore left shoulder as he contemplated his work.

Twenty-three dead men and nine dead women lay in state on the fore deck of their ruined ship, each wrapped in a shroud of sailcloth, a small burning candle stuck with wax to the deck beside each. Usopp had not been able to identify which of them might have been the captain, so he simply placed the body of the man who had died under his care at the head of the group. He had, however, discovered that the ship's flag still dangled limply from the tip of the main mast, and brought it down.

The flag was quartered blue and white; on the white squares flew the symbol of the World Government, that familiar dotted cross. The blue quarters bore an unfamiliar mark, an isosceles triangle in white with the bottom line gone. To the left, the letters 'GA' were marked in white, while the right side bore the letters 'TC'. Usopp drew a blank trying to identify the mark, but judging by the cargo of the ship it was probably the logo of some merchant company. The flag's layout at least held some familiarity to him: he'd seen the same on the rare ship belonging to Kaya's parents' shipping company that would dock at Syrup Village when he was young. Before he knew Kaya or that the manor on the hill belonged to the president of a merchant company that frequently took World Government commissions, Usopp had spent his days pretending those ships were pirate ships come to pillage his home town, and he'd stalked through the trees on the cliffs above the north and south ports, playing at hunting down evil pirates.

As Usopp folded the flag and laid it beneath the shrouded head of the man who had briefly been his only living companion in hell, he mused that he'd never actually found out the name of Kaya's parents' company; it hadn't seemed important when his only intention in climbing the tree by her window and telling her tall tales had been to bring some cheer back to her eyes, help her laugh and smile again after losing her only family. Now, the fear that had thrummed gently in the far back of his mind since he first set out to sea- the fear that he might never see home again -was his constant companion, and every thought of Syrup Village stung almost as badly as his cheek did with every thought of everything else he'd lost just days before.

For a while Usopp just stood there, keeping a silent watch over the corpses he'd arranged, trying for something resembling reverence. It had been a long time since he'd prayed- the only reason he'd gone to any religious service or house of worship after his mom was no longer around to take him there had been to get a free meal or ask the priest questions he never got answered -but he did remember some of his old lessons, so Usopp stood straight, placed his palms together just beneath his long nose, and closed his eyes.

 _Uh... God? Or gods? Or Buddha or whatever... ugh, the closest thing to a god I've come across was that wacked-out lightningbolt with the earlobes who nearly killed me... er, please carry the souls of these brave sailors to their final rest, yadda yadda yadda... uh, amen, I guess?_ Usopp opened his eyes and frowned at the still forms before him. "Jeez, I suck at prayer..." he muttered to himself, his voice a raspy gunshot in the nigh-silent air. The distant rumbling of the sea king's gargantuan heart beating seemed quieter than usual, as if it were asleep or something. Or maybe his hearing was just going, along with every other part of him.

 _Wait,_ thought Usopp suddenly in the midst of trying to rub some of the ache out of his lower back. _Something's... missing..._ he stood for a moment, trying to identify what the absence he was sensing was, and it came to him after a moment: he hadn't heard the sea-beast's dying groaning since he'd woken up. A strange pang went through him, a sense of loss like a miniature version of his feelings when he'd discovered the sailor's death, but he quickly shook his head and sighed, dismissing the notion of mourning for an unfamiliar animal that would probably have eaten him under other circumstances as another sick reaction of his fraying mind.

Usopp was just about to turn around head back across the plank bridge to the Going Merry's deck when a flicker of movement caught his eye. He tried to catch its source in his sight, turning as fast as he could manage, but the only thing he saw was a pile of broken wood, splintered planks from the bites taken out of the deck and railing of this now empty wreck. Beside the pile was a small barrel, its lid partially ajar, and judging by the black residue on the barrel's edge it seemed to be full of pitch.

 _Huh... guess I missed that,_ Usopp thought as he walked over to it, hefting the weighty container and placing the lid more securely onto it. _Well, supplies are supplies..._ He walked back toward the little bridge to the Going Merry, trying to ignore the floaty numbness that was creeping into the edges of his mind, but right before he took his first step up onto the boards a sudden flash of movement entered and then left his peripheral vision. Usopp let out what might have been a high-pitched yelp if it weren't for his hoarse voice and spun to face whatever it was that had caught his eye, the barrel of pitch dropped onto the deck. Usopp didn't quite register that the lid had popped off again and the thick black substance was pouring slowly out onto the floor; he stood there with his slingshot in hand, pouch drawn taut with an Exploding Star loaded, whipping his head wildly around to find the culprit.

 _I am the only. Living. Thing. In this fleshy hell. There was something moving! I'm sure of it! But what?!_ Usopp's thoughts raced as he turned slowly, pivoting in place and watching every inch of space that passed in front of him like a starving hawk. Stillness was all around him, not a hint of motion could be seen. Usopp shook his head and lowered his weapon, then glared at the spilled pitch and sighed. "Well... whatever..." he grumbled, and turned to head back to the Merry.

Once inside the galley Usopp noticed that the floorboards were still stained with blood, but he made the executive decision that he didn't feel up to the task of cleaning it up. Nor was he immensely concerned with the other things that still bore great reddish-brown stains, namely his own clothing. A niggling thought that he might feel better if he took the time to at least clean off his overalls- _cleanliness is an exercise of control, you_ need _to exercise some control on_ something _-_ but the washboard and laundry tub were stored, where else? In the men's quarters. Even now, the prospect of reentering that room made Usopp's throat clench up.

Stress and worry still weighing down his sore shoulders, Usopp reached for the crate of looted rum that still sat on the floor near his bed of sailcloth. He pulled the cork out of the retrieved bottle with his teeth and sat down on his makeshift pallet, taking a long swig and coughing just a little. He stared out the open galley door, right at the wrecked ship and its crew of ghosts, trying to process what had happened over the last day. _Two dozen dead men_ , Usopp thought, taking another drink and letting the rum burn down his throat. _Twenty-three on one ship, and only one on the other._

"Goddammit..." Usopp grumbled, tearing his gaze away from the once-floating crypt to stare at the walls of his own mausoleum. "Mourning sailors I never knew, mourning damn sea monsters... I can't die here." The declaration felt at once comforting and terrifying, but Usopp was glad he'd said it. "I can _not_ afford... to die in this damn sea king's guts." He laid his hand upon the galley floor and closed his eyes for a moment. " _We_ can't afford to die... right, Merry?"

As he opened his eyes, Usopp started as he saw- much more clearly than any time before -a flash of movement, ducking just out of his field of vision out on the Going Merry's fore deck. He let out a gasp and stood far too quickly, a chorus of dull protest coming from his various still-unhealed wounds, and he stopped to let the aching pass with a hand pressed gingerly against his side and his teeth gritted in pain. By the time his mind had cleared and he'd stumbled his way out onto the deck, standing there with his slingshot aimed over the railing in front of the galley, the fore deck was once again still.

Usopp stared in disbelief for a moment, looking about and seeing nothing, not even a hint of movement. _I could've sworn... I saw a shape, a figure moving... it looked kinda like a person..._ Cautiously Usopp made his away down the stairs and up onto the fore deck, his grip on his slingshot like an iron vice. Out in the dimly-lit shadows of the sea-king's belly a hollow creaking sound echoed, like a single footstep on a ship's deck, and Usopp nearly pissed himself as he whirled about to face the direction of the noise, his heart pounding in his ears almost drowning out the low, rolling rumble of the sea-king's heartbeat.

The wrecked ship was before him, but Usopp's eyes didn't even remotely register its ruined mass as he spotted another flicker of movement: something vaguely human-shaped disappearing quickly further onto the deck of the ship. The shadows and the dimness of the Going Merry's galley lights at this distance made the details impossible to make out, but Usopp was certain beyond all doubts that he was not actually alone in this sea-king's stomach. He swallowed heavily and tried to steady himself, then walked slowly up the makeshift bridge to the wrecked ship's deck.

There was no movement among the wrapped bodies, nor among the wreckage of the foremast and the bitten-off section of the ship. Usopp was hesitant to lower his weapon, but the candles he'd lit for his funeral pageantry had all but burned out, and he needed light. He turned on his light dial, flooding the surrounding area with illumination, and as he blinked to help his eyes adjust to the brightness, a small shift of movement caught the corner of his vision.

 _Hold on_ , Usopp thought, staring forward into the middle distance just above the arranged bodies, trying to concentrate on the movement in his peripheral vision without actually looking at it. _Every time I turn to look, whatever this thing is just disappears from sight... so the only way to look at it is to_ not _look at it!_ Perhaps it didn't make sense, but Usopp was not exactly in a state of mind that could rely too heavily on sensibility.

Sure enough, something was shifting at the very far left of his peripheral vision, but it was hard to make out. Usopp's eyes began to water as he stared forward, willing his sight to keep track of the moving shape. The movement was methodical but quick, almost humanlike but at the same time not. The colors were especially disorienting, hard to truly comprehend, as if an image were printed in blank and white, and in full color at the same time. The suggestion of yellow and white, hints of blue and brown, would at one moment seem solid and another, immaterial.

Usopp finally couldn't take it any more and he blinked several times, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of his hand as he attempted to keep a solid idea of what he'd seen. It wasn't big, whatever it was, and though it seemed humanoid it was amorphous, limbs and a head discernable but unclear at times. Usopp blinked a few more times and he opened his eyes again, glancing over at where he'd previously been looking; sure enough, whatever it was that kept dancing along the edges of his awareness was gone. In front of where Usopp had spotted that movement was the pile of unidentified broken wood he had noted earlier, the spot where he'd found that stray barrel of pitch which now stained the deck over a dozen feet away.

Cautiously Usopp approached the pile of wood, his eyes straining the keep the very edges of his vision clear, in case that same moving entity might suddenly appear again. The only interesting thing about this pile of wood- unrecognizable now, but perhaps it had once been a crate or barrel -was the dark stain on the deck beside it, where that pitch barrel had been set. The stain thinned out and trailed off toward the stairs that led to the hold of the wrecked ship, looking like drips of pitch that had been smeared by someone's footsteps. Those blurry footprints seemed to point toward the wood pile, rather than away from it, but there was no trail of even light footprints leading away from the pile.

As Usopp examined the scene his eyes kept drifting back toward the pile of shattered wood, a niggling, incomplete thought pushing up from through the fabric of his mind just a moment as he examined the wood, and he blinked hard to try and dispel it. It was an odd thought, feeling like it originated both from deep inside him and from outside his mind, at the same time.

' _Traditionally, funeral ships are burned,'_ the thought proclaimed, and Usopp was certain the voice that spoke them was a familiar one, but distant, like a dream long-forgotten. He shook his head at that persistent thought; burn a ship? In an enclosed space, right next to the Going Merry, and while probably underwater?

"It's crazy..." Usopp mumbled to himself as he turned back around and tromped back toward the Merry, his eyes dancing in their sockets as he kept an eye out for whoever- or whatever -had been moving about on this abandoned wreck.

For all his paranoia and cowardice, Usopp had never been certain if he believed in ghosts. Even one particular... incident on Skypeia had been an unclear interaction, about which Usopp certainly had his suspicions, but it hadn't solidified his position on the paranormal anymore than the inherent strangeness of living in a world that featured things like Devil Fruit and giant, island-crushing sea kings did. As he walked back into the galley of the Going Merry and a sudden chill on the back of his neck prompted him to spin in place suddenly and look about wildly, trying to catch some glimpse of _something_ , all that previous uncertainty was looking more and more naive.

 _It won't do any good to obsess over it, though, Usopp_ , he reassured himself as he finally closed the galley door behind him and sat back down on the sailcloth pallet. _Best try to find something useful to do, if there is anything._

Usopp reached for the bottle of rum again.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

With three crates of rum salvaged from the wreck, Usopp had been sure he would have enough to last him several days. He thought so, anyway. He would've attempted to draw up some more solid calculations at the time, but it was kind of hard to wrap his mind around time in this sunless pit, and even harder to do math in his head while blitzed out of his mind on cheap rum. It might even be called inadvisable, or deleterious to his health, if Usopp had been in any condition to remember that those words existed, let alone say them coherently.

"Fuckin'... grammar was never my best... best subj'ct..." Usopp slurred into the empty air. He blinked rapidly as he tried to line up his hammer with a nail pinched between his numb, bandage-wrapped fingers, held up against a board placed over a gap in the inner hull of the Going Merry's hold.

Attempting carpentry while drunk as all hell might similarly be inadvisable and deleterious and all those other fancy ways of saying 'you're gonna hurt yourself you fucking moron', but Usopp was far past caring. He'd already hammered the tips of his left hand's fingers into a dull, numb throb in the vague shape of digits while putting the first nail in this board, so by his reckoning he didn't have much more to risk.

At least this time he'd thought to set the rum bottle on the ground before he started swinging.

 _Okay, here we go..._

 _'Crack!'_

"Ow, shit!"

As Usopp pressed the knuckle just below his thumb under his right arm in a vain attempt to dull the pain, he glared at the offending board and took another drink. Or at least, he glared in the board's general direction; the damn thing seemed to be moving around an awful lot for a stationary inanimate object.

Usopp had lost track of time, at some point after coming back to the Merry from his wild goose-chase after that irritating phantom _thing_ that kept cropping up in his peripheral vision. His best guess was that five days had passed since the last sailor's death. This was based mostly on how many times he'd passed out and woken up since then, along with the fact that he'd come almost to the end of the salvaged rum.

Usopp's stomach gave a low grumble, and he pressed his last bottle against his lips again, trying to calm his belly.

It turned out, just keeping the fresh foods refrigerated wasn't quite enough. Whenever the door was opened to access that food, the mysterious, rot-inducing agent in the air of this sea king's stomach was introduced to the fridge, and by the (presumably) third day from the wreck's arrival all the fresh food had moldered into filth. The preserved food didn't really last much longer, and Usopp had eaten his last proper meal of the last salvageable dried fish almost a full day before. The nascent threat of starvation- now a sickening certainty -was only beaten back by copious application of alcohol.

With the end of his supply fast approaching, Usopp was fraying at the seams and could hardly focus.

Not to say that he'd spent the last few days as a totally idle drunken fool. No, Usopp had made good on his intention to find something useful to do, for a certain definition of the word. Hesitant to go through the rigmarole of applying Sticky Star substance to his shoes and wading out into the sea king's gastric juices, Usopp had worked on any and every task he could think of that could be performed upon the Going Merry. He'd fixed breaks in the hull, sealed anything and everything he could think to with pitch and tar, and even spent a little more time making Sticky Stars until he finally ran out of the required elements to create them. Seeing as he made this batch of the adhesive ammo while trashed on cheap booze, their effectiveness was at best suspect, but Usopp hadn't dwelled on it at the time and didn't plan to now.

At this point, though, Usopp had to admit to himself as he finally nailed the board into place, he was essentially stalling to avoid walking around in the acidic waters with his back to the darkness of the cavernous stomach. Everything he could conceivably accomplish on the deck was... well, complete, as much as it could be in the current circumstances.

Stumbling and swaying a little, the half-empty rum bottle gripped as firmly as he could manage, Usopp exited the hold pointedly did not look at the dark mass of the wrecked ship as he wandered back into the galley, trying to ignore the strong scent of rot that now floated about and mingled with the acrid air. The crates of rotted food had been tossed overboard the previous day to lay in a slowly-dissolving pile in the shallow waters beside the Merry, and the galley now seemed as cavernously empty as the stomach in which she languished. Aside from the wrecked remains of the former dining table piled one corner, the only things in the room were the empty wine rack, the thin sailcloth pallet Usopp had passed out on or at least near for the past few days, the little wooden stand that Usopp called his factory, and a single canvas sack, sitting almost empty.

Huffing, Usopp took another long drink of rum and sat at his Usopp Factory, pulling out the set of Sticky Stars he'd made the day previous and beginning the long, messy task of applying their gooey contents to his feet and legs. In the end the Sticky Stars went on easily, and the mess he'd anticipated leaving behind was minimal. Even the act of standing and walking didn't leave as much residue on the deckboards as it had the first or second times he'd used this method. Better than expected results aside, though, Usopp could hardly find any pleasure in his tiny achievements as he glared blearily at the empty bottle in his hand.

 _Really gotta do something about this._ Usopp set the empty bottle down on the counter in the kitchen area and walked haltingly to the side of the room, staring and contemplating and wracking his brains to try and think if there were anything, anything at all, left on this ship he might be able to drink with even a drop of booze in it.

It was like a lightbulb went off in his head, and Usopp knelt unsteadily in front of the canvas sack: the sack Stalter had given him, days ago, to bolster his supplies, which Usopp had emptied of most useable supplies during the first instance of quick-rotting food. The only thing remaining in the sack, which he now emptied and tossed aside, was a single small barrel, containing home-made cider.

"Thank you, Stalter..." Usopp slurred raspily as he tapped the small keg, letting forth a stream of sweet, golden-brown booze that might as well have been the nectar of the gods. After taking a drink directly from the keg, he grabbed the empty rum bottle and filled it near full, corking it and sticking it into his satchel for easy access. And if the welcome burn of the strong spirit as it ran down his throat was accompanied by a slightly off-tasting sweetness and an unusual scent, Usopp was far beyond complaining. One more quick trip into the hold to pick up a bundle of boards and a small barrel of pitch, plus some rope rigged into a harness that could keep the building materials suspended out of the reach of the acidic waters, and Usopp tromped his way to the rope ladder and made his way unsteadily downward.

Stomach acid lapped around the polymer shield pasted up Usopp's calves as he walked around the perimeter of the Going Merry's current resting place, stepping gingerly over the still-snagged anchor as he made his way past the fore of the little ship. The steel mass was rusting, he noticed, and the flesh of the sea king's stomach in which it had embedded itself days ago seemed to have grown up around it, clinging like the Sticky Stars on Usopp's shoes (and approximately the same color, in the light of the dial gripped in his non-booze-wielding hand) and he took a moment to silently bemoan the difficulty he'd face in the future when he had to extract the anchor and reel it in.

As he continued his trek around the Merry's hull, Usopp made a mental note of every bit of damage he thought he could fix. Splitting seams, rusting tin and steel plates, dry rot, wet rot, barnacle-rot, and rotting caulking were all evident; this environment was torture on the poor little ship's already rough condition, and Usopp took a self-pitying swig from his bottle of cider as he muttered under his breath about how much of a useless idiot he was for neglecting to address these issues for so long and putting the Going Merry through yet more trouble. With a heavy sigh and a slight hiccup, Usopp grabbed his caulking tools and got to work.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

About two hours into working on the various damages to the hull, Usopp took a break to go refill his bottle from the keg of cider, and to trade his light dial for his hurricane lantern, leaving it to charge off the galley lights (which Usopp was becoming more and more sure had dimmed significantly since entering this fleshy prison; it only made sense that they would, seeing as they'd been switched on non-stop for over a week). Standing there in the galley, he belched loudly and coughed a little. His stomach was becoming a bit queasy on a diet of nothing but liquor.

 _Not like I have anything else... water, I do need to remember to drink water, duh..._ One quick detour to the sink to indulge in some fresher-than-previous lukewarm water, and Usopp's stomach hadn't exactly _calmed_ , but at least it didn't feel like he was going to hurl. Even the quickly-passing vertigo that struck his as he walked up to the railing over which the rope ladder had been hung was more welcome than tossing his only sustenance into the acid-water for a second time. Usopp climbed down the ladder and used a match to light the oil in his lantern, summoning a flickering field of orange-gold light to beat bad the persistent darkness.

As he stood in the light of the lantern that hung from a hook on a rope slung over the railing above, pounding nails into a board held over a splitting seam in the Going Merry's aft hull, Usopp stopped suddenly with a groan as a wave of dizziness welled up from inside him to fill his head with haze. He leaned against the hull and breathed slowly, trying to figure out where this sudden feeling was coming from. Usopp's vision blurred and he felt as though all his blood was going into his head, as if he'd been hanging upside-down for hours.

 _Urgh, oh god, I'm gonna..._ was all Usopp had time to think before his stomach rebelled and he let forth a stream of sour sick, his shoulders shuddering with effort as the involuntary action of his irritated gut wracked his whole malnourished frame.

 _Is it ironic or poetic that I'm barfing into a stomach?_ Usopp pondered vacantly as his vision slowly cleared. He leaned against the Going Merry's hull, panting heavily, his shaking knees barely supporting him as he stuck his hammer and the bottle of cider back into his bag to keep from dropping them from his nerveless fingers. Spots of color like he'd seen after looking directly into the sun for too long rose and died out in his vision, and he rubbed at his eyes, trying to clear his vision further. His ears were full of the muffled rumbling thump of the sea king's slow heartbeat, but it seemed louder than usual, and each ponderous rumbling beat sent a spark of pain and even more dizziness roiling though his skull.

The darkness rumbled and groaned around Usopp, and as he peered out into the black space beyond the edge of the tiny pool of light that sprung from the lantern's flame, his heart quickened to a frantic rhythm when he saw movement in the distance. Unhooking the lantern from its hanging place, he strained his blurring vision to try and identify the source of the movement. For an instant Usopp thought it might be something vaguely humanoid, perhaps that phantom of his peripheral vision from days previous manifesting in plain view out in the dimness of the cavernous stomach, but as a bubble of nausea gurgled up out of his stomach he saw that was not the case.

Shadows, reaching black shadows, curled along the surface of the acidic water, just at the edge of the lantern's light. The darkness seemed to swell against Usopp's eyes, as if the walls of the sea king's stomach were closing in on him- or perhaps, as if the flesh of the walls was extruding enormous, monstrous pieces of itself to stalk slowly, hungrily towards him. The shadows bulged and seemed about to burst when Usopp cried out and stumbled toward the rope ladder, not even realizing or caring that he had left the bundle of salvaged planks and the barrel of pitch hanging from the rope harness slung over the Merry's aft railing.

Back on deck, his feet sticking slightly to the planks, Usopp tried his best to run back to the shelter of the galley lights, but a curious stretching sensation robbed him of his momentum, as if the distance from the railing to the stairs had suddenly doubled, then tripled, then quadrupled. Instead he fell to his knees, lantern clattering to the deck and only staying upright by sheer luck, and gripped his stomach as sweat poured down his face and neck. Space seemed to stretch out before his eyes like an infinite plain, close enough to touch but too far to ever reach, and Usopp barely found the strength to crawl on his shaky knees toward the Merry's main mast.

"Shit... what..." Usopp gasped as he sat back against the mast, facing the Going Merry's fore deck with his legs splayed out and his hands on his chest, feeling his heart hammering away faster than it had since... since he and Luffy...

 _A fist swung out of the cloud of dust and struck, like a blow from a wrathful god, and it took all Usopp's strength of will not to drop to his knees right there and give in, give up, because he was going to die if he persisted-_

Usopp gasped with a jolt as he surfaced, floundering, from the dreamlike memory. His head was still pounding, his heart still beating like a rabbit's, and his vision was still swimming with sourceless light and color, tunneled by shadows encroaching on his peripheral vision. His tongue felt as though a thick coat of sour fur was coating the inside of his mouth, and his stomach, though empty, was still churning violently.

"Gah... ugh... goddammit!" Usopp panted as he tried to stand, but just wound up stumbling and collapsing to his knees. A tickle in his dry throat spawned a bout of chest-rattling coughs, and he was overcome with thirst. Blinking against the dim glow spilling through the windows of the galley, Usopp estimated the strength he had available to put into the task of crawling all the way to the sink for a drink of water and found himself falling short. As he shifted, a _clink_ of glass on metal at his hip drew his attention, and he looked down and remembered that he'd stuck his cider-filled bottle in his satchel for easy storage. Usopp swallowed past the dryness in his throat and groaned as another wave of nausea rolled up from his stomach into his head to settle as a throbbing pressure behind his eyes, a headache not helped by his violent coughing.

 _Well... better'n nothing..._ Usopp reasoned dizzily as he uncorked and upended the bottle into his mouth, pouring the last of the sweetly-sickening cider into his parched throat. The sour off-taste of vomit mingled with the flavor of the strong drink, and it took every last ounce of willpower not to burp it all back up and restart the process. At least his throat and mouth weren't drier than a damn desert any longer, but that wave of combined dizziness and nausea filled Usopp's head again. He tipped forward, colors rolling in front of his eyes as the deck of the Going Merry rose rapidly to meet his face with a gentle _crack_.

 _At least I remembered... to turn my head... so m'nose didn't break_ , thought Usopp as fatigue and illness overcame him, and his eyes slowly drifted closed. The darkness behind his eyelids was full of shifting color that churned like a kaleidescope, despite the lack of light or a solid shape on which the colors could concentrate. Unconsciousness came quickly, and Usopp hardly noticed it when it did; through the aches and pains of his abused, unhealing body, a day or more of starvation, and nearly a week of heavy alcohol abuse, Usopp was already numbed to sleeping inside.

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

 _Usopp...!_

Grumbling in half-consciousness, Usopp rolled over onto his side, squinting against the bright light pressing against his aching eyes through the thin flesh of his eyelids. His head was full of cotton and caltrops, and every dull, distant noise that reached his ears was like agony.

 _'Usopp...!'_

Usopp grunted with a deep grimace, his eyes blinking blearily open, then shutting just as quickly as pain lanced through his skull as searing light burned into his retinas. The wooden floor beneath him seemed to shake suddenly, rhythmic thumping that slowly intensified, joined by the sound of several heavy objects hitting the deckboards in time with the shaking. Usopp's hazy, sleepy brain remembered after a moment that this phenomenon was called 'footsteps'.

 _That doesn't make any sense... I'm alone..._

"Usopp! Get up!"

Usopp's eyes shot open at the sound of the voice, his heart clenching in shock and wonder and fear and hope, and despite how stiff and pained his body had been moments ago he picked himself up off the deck, propped up on his right elbow just in time to see several familiar pairs of legs charge along the Going Merry's deck toward the fore deck's stairs.

"What...?" Usopp mumbled, his voice hoarse with sleep as he looked around. Why was he laying on the deck by the main mast? Perhaps he'd laid down for a nap in the afternoon sun?

"Hey, Usopp! Come on up! You gotta see this!" a voice from above him called out. For a second Usopp's throat tightened and tears formed at the corners of his eyes as a wave of misery and anger rolled through his mind at the sound of that voice, but it was gone as soon as it came, leaving no trace of its existence as he finally pushed himself up onto his knees to peer up at the silhouetted form of what could only be his goofy captain.

"What do I have to see, Luffy?" Usopp said with a slight yawn as he tried to focus on his captain's face, though it wasn't easy. He had to squint and hold his hand up as the light assaulted his eyes; the sun was positioned in the sky almost directly behind Luffy, leaving him a little hard to see directly, but from the wide toothy grin to the ratty old straw hat it was surely his captain leaning over the railing of the Going Merry's fore deck, excitement evident in every tiny movement of his noodly frame as he beckoned Usopp with both hands, hopping from foot to foot like an agitated monkey.

"We just spotted a new island! It looks so cool, you need to come see it!" Luffy cried out before he turned and ran just out of sight to the front of fore deck, probably to take his place in his special seat on the Merry's figurehead. A spark of irritation popped into and out of Usopp's head suddenly at that thought, but he just shook his head as he scrambled to his feet and charged up the stairs to join the rest of the crew in beholding their newest port of call.

The sunlight was still piercing almost directly into his eyeballs, but Usopp could pick out the dimmed, silhouetted shapes of the Straw Hat Pirates, all standing at or near the railings, peering out into the sea beyond. Just above the crown of Luffy's head Usopp could see their destination, bathed in shadow and golden sunlight as it was. A tiered city built over most of an island, a giant water fountain spewing out the top, huge dry-dock doors with painted numbers on them, and a large number of boats and ships moving about the island's ports.

"There it is, Water 7 at last," Nami said from Usopp's left, her voice tinged with pride and satisfaction. Usopp turned to look at her, but the sunlight still flowed around his crewmate's body, casting her in shadowy silhouette. Something about the name of the island dropped a stone of dread into the deep well of his gut, and he looked about at the sun-bathed silhouettes of the rest of his crew, all of them facing forward toward the island with body language that expressed rapturous excitement.

"A city like this must be full of history," mused Robin quietly, from Usopp's right. Her arms were crossed, her shoulders set as she leaned against the railing. "I'll need to pay a visit to a bookstore or two."

It was a strange unease that crawled across Usopp's shoulders and neck, a vague anxiety he couldn't quantify.

"Ah, Robin, my love~! As gorgeous as you are intelligent!" crooned Sanji as he spun in place and went to a knee, his back to the approaching island and his hand outstretched toward Robin's silhouette. "If I could, I would gladly gather every historical text on the island and deliver them into your beautiful hands!"

"Pft... sappy love-cook... " muttered Zoro from near the upper-left of the fore deck. He was leaning back against the railing, the sunlight pouring across the left side of his face as he stood with his muscular arms crossed.

"What was that, you shitty algae-scalped bastard?!" Sanji growled, jumping to his feet to glare across the deck at a thoroughly disinterested Zoro. Luffy and Robin both laughed aloud as Sanji and Zoro bickered back and forth, the captain's laughter loud and clear and Robin's an understated chuckle. Nami, meanwhile, balled her hands into fists and placed them on her hips, and gave an exasperated sigh.

"Hey morons, cut the argument and focus!" the navigator shouted, reaching up to grab Sanji by the collar and Zoro by the sleeve.

Usopp lost track of the bickering at that point- Zoro glared at Nami and said something sarcastic, Sanji danced between worshipping Nami and threatening Zoro, Nami somehow added another 30,000 Berries to Zoro's debt, and so on -because he felt a tug at the leg of his overalls. Looking down Usopp saw the sun-dappled silhouette of Chopper, a cheerful smile on his furry face as the light of the sunset played across his wonder-filled eyes.

"Isn't that island cool, Usopp?" the reindeer doctor exclaimed, pulling Usopp by his pants to walk a few steps further into the center of the fore deck. Usopp swallowed heavily and tried to smile- _this is normal, right? I should be smiling. Just another adventurous day on the open sea_ -then turned his face away from Chopper to stare out at the looming structure visible just past Luffy's shoulder.

"Y-yeah... it's really awesome," Usopp said, injecting more enthusiasm into his voice than he could work up inside at the moment. _This is the way things should be. Luffy laughing, Zoro and Sanji fighting, Nami wrangling them, Robin watching it all, Chopper full of excitement... this is the Straw Hat Pirates. But why can't I...?_

Chopper was talking, but Usopp wasn't really hearing what he was saying. A reply from Robin about book or something made the little doctor cheer aloud and jump, but Usopp could not tear his eyes away from Water 7. All conversation faded into the background as he wrestled with this dark cloud of worry fogging his mind. Wood creaked and waves splashed, and Usopp tried to focus on the shadowed form of the island city, but it slipped from his sight, as if it were only a mirage.

A phrase penetrated the haze in his head, something Nami was yelling at the still-shouting chef and grumbling swordsman, and it drew his attention back like a fish caught on a hook. "-got to find a shipwright!"

"Yeah! We need someone who's good at fixing ships!" called Luffy, spinning in place on his special seat to face the rest of the crew. Usopp hadn't realized it when Chopper was pulling him, but he was standing in the dead-center of the fore deck, with crew members all around, facing Luffy directly. His captain made eye-contact with him, and his grin widened by a few molars. Something in this expression, so familiar and full of humor, struck some chord in Usopp's chest. His breath was knocked out of him, and tension began to wind up inside him like a chain on a crank.

Luffy laughed. "We gotta get someone who can replace Usopp!"

Usopp's heart clenched. "W-what?"

"Well, we _do_ need someone who can actually fix ships properly," Nami said, and Usopp spun to face her. Her smile, so mischievous and playful, now seemed devious and malicious. "If we can hire someone who has experience as a shipwright and carpenter we can probably even keep a ship from falling apart on us after a couple months of travel."

"W-wait, hold on-" Usopp began, but he was cut off as Zoro laughed, and he spun to face the swordsman.

"Are you surprised, Nami? It's just a dinky little caravel. Barely more than a dinghy." The smirk on Zoro's face was one Usopp had seen him direct at Sanji many times, but it was full of cruelty now, paired with his words. Usopp stumbled back at the sight, and Zoro continued. "We should make sure we spend all this gold on a _good_ ship to replace it, eh, Captain?"

Usopp shook his head, incredulous, as Luffy nodded with an air of mock sagacity, his chin in his hand while he closed his eyes as if in meditation, though the too-wide grin remained. "Yeaaaahhh..." he drawled, feigning contemplation, "this old boat's broken and kinda lame-looking. We should get a cool one! With big cannons!"

"And a bigger kitchen!" Sanji piped up, the cheerful tone of his voice undercut by how he glanced at Usopp, sneering as he spoke. "It's hard to prepare proper treats for my two lovely ladies in the tiny crap kitchen we've got now."

"I need a _real_ office for my medical supplies! This ship is really dirty, and it's not a sanitary place to do surgeries at all!" Chopper said cheerfully. Usopp couldn't even look at the little reindeer, afraid of what he would see on that innocent face.

"Maybe we'll have room for a library?" suggested Robin, and when Usopp whipped his head about to face her, he could swear she looked at him just like she had the first time they met, when she was only Miss All-Sunday to him: predatory, mocking, like he was a twig she could snap in an instant and she only refrained to prolong her amusement with him.

"We definitely need more cannons, and bigger cannons!" Luffy shouted again, hopping up to stand on top of the figurehead, his fists raised in the air, and as his eyes met Usopp's a look of such scorn came over the rubbery pirate captain's visage. Usopp had never seen anything even close to that look on Luffy's face, even jokingly. But Luffy wasn't done: he hopped off the figurehead, took two long steps until he was right up in front of Usopp, and said, "We'll need someone who can run them better than Usopp, too! He needs to be able to actually pick up the cannonballs!"

"Buh... wha... I can pick up a cannonball!" Usopp sputtered, confusion, fear, misery, indignation, and rage swirling inside him like a hurricane. As if on a practiced cue, every other member of the Straw Hat Pirates laughed at once, long and loud. Usopp backed up until he hit the railing and could go no farther, whipping his head about wildly to stare each of his laughing, mocking crewmates in the eye. The golden light of sunset deepened to a dull reddish glow, and the shadows across the forms of the crew took on strange, jagged edges, like knives of darkness.

"Sure, you can, Usopp," chuckled Nami. "And I bet you could even put together a weapon with actually _useful_ functions, right? Or maybe navigate a storm without getting swept into the Calm Belt?"

"And you can preserve food so it doesn't rot in a day?" Sanji sneered, taking a long drag on his cigarette, illuminating the expression of disdain upon his shadowed face as the ember flared.

"Can you treat someone's wounds so they don't bleed out on your own bed?" Chopper giggled, as if it were the funniest thing in the world.

"Have you ever even lifted anything heavier than a bundle of wood?" Zoro asked, as if asking a small child if he knew how to tie his shoes.

"You have sharp eyes, right, Mr. Long-Nose? Sharp enough not to lose track of a few million Berries?" Robin said, looking down the ridge of her sharp nose at him, like someone might look at an unfortunate stain on a white bedsheet.

"N-no! Why are you saying this?!" Usopp cried out. His knees were shaking, so to keep himself from collapsing to the floor his hands were gripping the railing behind him hard enough that the wood was creaking from the force. In front of him, the crew stood together like a wall of mockery, the red light playing at the edges of their faces. Behind them, Water 7 towered above the ship, as if it were leaning down to judge him. In the middle of the row of mocking faces before him, Luffy raised a hand and pointed at him.

"Sorry Usopp, but we have to do what's best for the crew. We're gonna be going on without you," Luffy said, each word like a bullet in Usopp's gut.

"It just makes sense, Usopp," Nami said, a hint of exasperation in her voice. "Think about it: whatever you can do, anyone else on the crew can do it just as well or better. I can do lookout duties..."

"I can do chemistry..." Chopper chimed in.

"I'm a faster runner than you are by a mile..." said Sanji, flicking his cigarette onto the floor and stomping on it.

"I'm much better at sneaking around and hiding than you are..." Robin said with a small chuckle.

"And every one of us is a better fighter than you," Zoro barked.

"It's simple, Usopp!" Luffy crowed with a cheerful giggle.

"N-no..." Usopp whimpered, tears running down his face. In unison, the people standing before him- people he thought he loved, he thought he trusted -shouted out happily:

"You're useless!"

Usopp hung his head, glaring at the deck beneath his feet, as the _things_ in front of him laughed and laughed. Rage boiled deep in the pit of his stomach, tensing the shaking muscles of his legs and straightening his back. With a growl, Usopp took two steps forward and reached into his satchel, whipped out his slingshot and an Exploding Star, loaded the pellet into the pouch of the weapon and pulled back the cord, aiming it right at the face of his former captain. The laughter died down as Usopp stood there, panting hard, and all eyes fixed on him.

"I know one thing I can do that _none_ of you can!" Usopp spat, tears still gathered in his eyes. He pointed the slingshot at each person before him in turn as he spoke, hesitating only a moment when he got to Chopper. "I'm a sniper! I can hit an ant between the eyes from a thousand paces! Which one of you is better than me at _this_ , huh?!"

Silence was his only response, and Usopp let out another frustrated growl, stepping even closer to the Straw Hat Pirates. "Come on! Who has the balls, huh?! None of you can say you're a better sniper than me!"

Usopp froze as cold metal pressed hard against the back of his neck, pushing through his curtain of curled black hair to make direct skin contact. It was smallish, and round, and had a hollow in the middle, and he knew immediately what it was.

"No," said a voice behind him. It was a rough voice, slightly nasal, and serious as a heart attack. "None of them can say that. But I can."

Usopp hadn't heard that voice in... so, so long. But he knew it. Usopp swallowed past the lump in his throat and forced himself to speak.

"D... Dad...?"

"Guns are not for making threats, boy." The sound of the gun's hammer being cocked back reverberated through his spine. "They're tools of action."

Usopp closed his eyes-

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

 _Bang!_

A gunshot rang out.

Before him, the man clutched his chest and gasped raggedly as his knees gave out and the two pirates supporting him let him drop, but Usopp only smirked and blew smoke off the muzzle of his flintlock. "You're lucky- I aimed above your heart, so the bullet will probably lodge near your ribs. That means a slow bleed out rather than instant death, so you get to learn what it means to defy a pirate- and we'll even keep you alive if you learn your lesson. Aren't I a generous man?"

"Urgh… damn you…" the young man groaned as blood welled up from underneath where his hand was pressed against his red-stained white shirt. There was blood running from underneath his shock of green hair as well, from where his first mate had clocked him in the head with the butt of his rifle, and one of his feet was bent at an unnatural angle from where a heavy boot to his ankle had snapped it. Usopp saw his sharp eyes dart over to the side- ah, glancing at his swords, still held tight in the quartermaster's massive hands. Usopp sighed and shook his head, clicking his tongue disapprovingly.

"Now, now, I wouldn't entertain any ideas of escaping if I were in your shoes," the ruthless pirate captain of the Usopp Armada said, a sneering playfulness to his words. All around his loyal crewmen- the fiercest men in the East Blue -chuckled menacingly, as if daring the upstart bounty-hunter to try his luck. A muffled angry shout came out from behind, and Usopp glanced over his shoulder at the dark-haired young woman being restrained by two of his men; a ragged black bandana the green-haired one had been wearing was tied around her face as a gag, but she was glaring venomously above it. Her glasses were askew and she was bleeding from a crisscrossed slash that had split her Navy uniform open over her stomach, but she still struggled against the iron-hard grip of Usopp's bruisers. He feigned a considering look and tapped the barrel of his gun to his chin thoughtfully, glancing exaggeratedly between the bleeding young man and his Navy whore. After a moment a devious grin split his face, and the pirates standing around them started to laugh and whoop; they knew immediately what he was thinking.

"Here's a thought, swordsman: how about we see what lasts longer, your stubborn pride… or how much you value the wench's honor?" Usopp drawled, holstering his pistol. The air rang out with even more boisterous laughs and eager shouts of, "That's our captain!" along with more wordless whoops and hollering- his men were eying the Navy girl's struggling form hungrily. Horror and comprehension dawned on the young bounty hunter's face and he made to stand, shaking with pain, fear, and rage all at once, but a heavy blow from the first mate sent him sprawling into the dirt. Usopp laughed. "You tell me where the rest of your bratty friends ran off with my treasure _now_ , or you get to watch my men enjoy your girlfriend's company. So… what's it gonna be, Pirate Hunter-"

 _~:~:~:~:~:~_

A long way off, kneeling hidden behind a thornbush, Usopp stared in disgust and fear- he had to stop this! The pirate captain who was threatening his friends was fearsome, yes, but Usopp was a brave warrior! He could conquer his foe and bring him down, free his friends, and escape with them alive and unhurt! He reached down to grip the hilt of his longsword- a family heirloom, straight steel and burnished brass set with real diamonds and emeralds in the hilt, named _Naegling_ and the object of many legends -and stood up from behind his cover, drawing the famed sword and holding it out before him, blade pointed to the sky-

 _~:~:~:~:~_

A peal of thunder and the rushing of wind and rain could not drown out the powerful voice that roared behind him. "You useless maggot! Pull the line taut!"

Seaman Recruit Usopp whipped his head around and was blinded for a moment by a flash of lightning. The image burned into his retinas by the flash was one of a dozen or more young Marines spread out across the deck of the battleship, pulling on ropes and running hither and yon. He blinked against the rain and salt spray splashing into his eyes and jerked forward, pulled a few steps on the rain-slicked deck by the thing in his hands suddenly trying to tug away and his grip tightening on reflex.

"You idiot! Pull that damned rope!" roared the voice again, and Usopp turned about-face to see the wall of the ship's cabin directly behind him. In the center, illuminated from behind by the flickering lights of the open captain's cabin door, a huge mass of muscle and golden-brown hair bristled under a sopping wet coat that hung off his shoulders, and Usopp swallowed as his commanding officer reached out and grabbed the rope that was hanging slack in Usopp's hands.

"Go help bail out the hold if you're too much of a shrimpy moron to even hold a line!" Vice Admiral Yasopp growled, his voice almost drowned out by the roll of thunder and the crash of waves and the howl of the storm's winds. Usopp nodded and saluted quickly, informally, then left the rope in his father's more than capable hands to run for the door to the stairs.

Before he made it more than a few steps, however, a huge wave crashed against the battleship's starboard side, sweeping over the deck and taking Usopp's feet out from underneath him. As he crashed into the deck, hard, Usopp heard his father's voice give a wordless cry of anger and fear, growing quiet as though moving away from Usopp's ears, and Usopp picked himself up as fast as he could so he could look back over his shoulder at the line his old man should be holding-

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Darkness, stillness, broken by a single flickering flame. On the deck of the ship behind him a young girl in a raincoat stood. Her hand reached up to grab Usopp's overalls in a desperate grip, and her eyes met his. Piercing blue, like the sea after a storm, ringed with black and white. She shook her head and opened her mouth to speak, fear, pain and worry etching deep lines into her young face. Her lips moved, but no sound came out.

 _What?_ Usopp thought, and his mouth opened to say the word as well. He felt the sound leave his throat, but he heard nothing. Static, oppressive silence and a low, humming buzz in his chest were all that filled his ears. His hurricane lantern sat on the deck of the Going Merry, right next to the rope it had been hanging from over the side of the railing, providing the only illumination with its weak flame. The girl was gone, and Usopp was alone.

A wave of groggy dizziness filled Usopp's head as he stood fully, and his vision blurred as it came. He took a few steps toward the lantern, swaying as he picked it up and held it out. The pool of yellowish-orange light wavered at its edge, but Usopp swore he could see something moving just beyond the darkness. Shadows clawed at him at the light's perimeter, and Usopp groaned weakly as his head pounded and his gut churned.

Out of the corner of his eye, more movement caught Usopp's attentions, different movement: a small barrel rolled along the deck to settle near him, black stains around the lid showing it to be full of pitch. Usopp followed the line of the barrel's motion to a spot just outside the light of the lantern, and he saw a shape there, just hidden in shadow behind the storeroom door, before disappearing inside and closing the door with an audible _click_.

The sudden return of his hearing didn't even phase Usopp as he tried to run to the storage room door, stumbling and swaying as fatigue and sickness unsteadied his legs and weakened his back. His hand finally gripped the doorknob and he wrenched the door open, lantern held out to cast its light upon whatever it was that had run inside. Whether a ghost, a monster, or that strange girl who disappeared just moments ago-

 _~:~:~:~_

What Usopp saw there turned his insides into cold slop in an instant. There stood a red-and-black shape, almost manlike, but made of a glistening, fluid substance. Usopp gripped his rifle all the tighter and retreated slowly, deliberately, until his back pressed against the bookshelf behind him. The demon in front of him had what was ostensibly its head raised to the air, sniffing, searching; it was on the hunt, and Usopp was its prey... but then why didn't it lunge and attack him? He'd fought these creatures before, and in tight quarters like this dusty old library they never hesitated to overwhelm any hunter who might be threatening them.

From his left Usopp heard a horrified gasp. He looked out of the corner of his eye, cautious about facing away from the demon and losing focus on it even for a moment. A dark-haired woman was there, and he recognized her, he was sure, but his mind was occupied by fear and the name, the name, it just wouldn't come. Her face was contorted in a mask of horror and despair, but she wasn't looking at Usopp, nor at the demon in front of him, its form roiling like black liquid fire with red faces rising to its surface and melting away. Instead the dark-haired woman dropped to her knees, staring at the ground in front of her, her breath coming in short panicked gasps as tears filled her eyes.

"No... Usopp..." the woman sobbed, and Usopp felt a spark of confusion make itself known through the fear that clogged his mind. His eyes refocused, as though finally seeing something through a thick fog, and saw the woman's hands fisted in brown cloth. She laid her head down, tears leaking out to darken the cloth, but it was already darkened in places, nearly black. Usopp followed the dark spots up the line of the cloth's tooled pattern, past the woman's head, and saw where the brown terminated and red cloth began. Or at least, it was mostly red, with a few uneven patches of yellow before it transitioned into more brown, with dark red stains. Or was that the other way around?

A gurgling, rumbling noise drew Usopp's attention firmly back to the demon that stood before him. The creature's own head was turned down, though, its sniffing search abandoned as its eyes- if such hollow, liquid pits of red-tinged darkness could be called 'eyes' -locked onto the woman's shaking shoulders, her black hair spilled across the stained cloth that veiled the body beneath her. Usopp's eyes traced the shape of the body, brown limbs beneath yellow and red and darker brown, a brown neck stained with red, a rifle gripped tightly in its hand. As the demon leaned down Usopp gasped for air but could find none, and its maw opened wide, rippling black and red shadow full of thin cracks, breaks in the very stuff of the universe that cut as deeply as any knife.

The woman didn't notice, did not cease her mourning as her black hair was moved gently, shifting in the breeze of the demon's fetid breath. Usopp let out a choked gasp as the demon's long arm, tipped in a vicious claw, rose up and rested its menacing talons behind the woman's neck, not even placing any weight upon her skin. This creature was fear, was darkness and evil, and it was about to murder her, to add another corpse to the library floor, more dark hair and red blood spilling across the floor, darkening skin and cloth, bright eyes dimmed and staring into nothingness above a gaping mouth and a long nose-

"N-no! Get away!" Usopp cried, voice reedy with desperation as he raised his rifle, aimed briefly, and put a bullet right into the joining of the demon's neck and shoulder. Black flesh erupted, spattering the air with shadow and red darkness, and the beast reared back, eyes locked on Usopp's fearful gaze. Droplets of darkness sprayed across the face and hair of the woman, over the body beneath her, and she stilled momentarily, raising her head to look around, blinking through tears, but she didn't move beyond that.

"Usopp...?" the woman murmured hoarsely, looking down at the corpse beneath her, but Usopp could hardly pay a moment of attention as the demon took a shuddering gurgling step toward him, the distance between them closing in an instant. The gaping maw of the beast wrenched open even wider, wide enough to swallow him whole, and Usopp held his rifle up, aiming right into the swirling void, and his finger danced upon the trigger-

 _~:~:~_

 _"Now,"_ , came the whispered word beside him, and Usopp let out a swift, calm breath as he fired. The report of the gun in his hands was muffled by his earplugs, but he didn't even blink as the buck fifty meters away stumbled and collapsed, a spray of blood arcing in the air to catch the mid-afternoon light streaming down through the forest canopy. For one moment he was still, the whole world keeping still with him, hanging on tenterhooks for the next movement... but Usopp saw nothing shifting in the undergrowth.

 _"Nice,"_ the whispering voice said, and Usopp had to agree. That buck was a big one, at least an eight point rack. Standing up from under his blanket of woven leafy branches, he brushed off his pants and jacket, then traipsed over to where the deer went down, hanging his rifle over his shoulder. As he walked his mind was full of venison recipes, thoughts of tanning hide for new gloves and chaps, and plans to sell the bones and antlers to the strange old doctor in town. He'd have to remember to gift a portion of the meat to the family upon whose land he had been hunting; their daughter was a beautiful girl with golden hair, and he had hopes to court her, someday.

Usopp pushed aside the last bushy branches and reached his prize, a single clean bullet wound straight into the head just before the ear the only marking of its death. Usopp knelt beside the carcass, as his father had taught him to, and said a silent prayer of thanks to the gods of nature for the bounty he had just hunted, and thanked the deer's spirit as well for providing its meat to him.

As he opened his eyes again, a subtle movement caught Usopp's peripheral vision, and he turned to see a small, brown shape ducking beneath the bushes to the side. Worry in his heart, he stood slowly, stepping gently so as to not cause too much noise as his booted foot alighted upon the forest floor, and leaned onto one leg, craning his neck to see around the edge of the small mulberry bush.

Wide, liquid eyes, brown and shining, surrounded by soft dappled brown fur, met Usopp's own gaze, and his heart wrenched in regret. The fawn before him shuddered in fear, pressed back into the side of a nearby tree. It was young, but not a newborn- probably already weaned, though perhaps too early judging by its frail stature -and its nose, Usopp noted curiously, was a shiny, bright blue.

 _"A fawn this young wouldn't be alone with an adult male during this season... unless its mother were killed, and its father decided to watch over it..."_ the whispering voice said, and Usopp hated it for being right. This poor little deer might have lost its only family in the world now, thanks to him and his damned rifle! Despair filled Usopp from his gut to his gullet and he knelt down slowly, reaching out a hand toward the little orphan.

"Oh, little one... I'm so sorry..." Usopp murmured, his voice thick. The terrified creature curled up tighter against the hollow in the roots of the old oak tree, shaded from the dim sunlight by the branches of the mulberry bush, and let out a quiet, plaintive moan, almost to quiet to hear through his earplugs. Tears welled up in Usopp's eyes and he pulled his hand back.

 _"It's not your fault, Usopp,"_ said the whisper, and Usopp turned his head, ready to lash out at its source in his grief and regret-

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

The deck of a ruined ship, drenched in shadow, lay behind him. In the single pool of weak light, emerging from the hurricane lantern held in her hands, was that same girl, in the yellow raincoat, tears welling up in her strange blue eyes. Usopp lost his balance and fell back onto his rear, his eyes still locked on the strange girl. Her hood was pulled back now, and Usopp saw curled white hair, with strange curled brown growths- _horns, they're little horns_ -sitting atop her head.

The young girl reached out her hand and rested it on Usopp's knee. Her mouth moved as if she were speaking, but no sound could find its way to his ears... except distantly, distantly, as though heard from the other side of a wind-lashed canyon, he could hear just barely...

 _"-ake up, Uso-"_ she cried in her whispering voice, and Usopp shook his head, his thoughts all a-jumble in his echoing skull. Her expression went from merely sad to despairing, and she opened her mouth wide, as though shouting, but this time no whispering voice could crack the wall of his mind.

The deck beneath him shook suddenly, and a loud stomp of a leather boot upon old weathered wood filled his ears. Usopp whipped around suddenly, the light of the hurricane lantern illuminating the sight before him with flickering, golden light-

 _~:~_

"We're moving out, runt! Saddle up!" shouted his captain, and as the tall man turned and stomped away across the floor of the old ranch house Usopp blinked against the dim light of a morning just before sunrise, shifting in his bedroll to check his battered alarm clock to confirm the exact time as _way too goddamn early._

"Urgh... aye, sir," Usopp muttered, standing up with monumental effort and packing up his things, watching as the rest of his comrades did the same, brushing dust off his bedroll and trying to be thankful that- full of holes as it was this abandoned home at least gave them a roof over their heads the previous night. Groaning, he made his was out through the doorless doorway and saw that the horses were already untied and waiting, with their clients' carriages already hitched up.

As he made his way to find his horse among the others, Usopp saw one of their clients already awake and dressed, loudly berating his sheepish-looking captain. The redheaded woman was rich, no doubt about it- to be able to hire an entourage of twenty rangers to travel across the blasted wastelands on a two-month journey to who the hell knows where, she'd have to be -but her manner was as grumpy and miserly as any pennypinching shopkeeper in the slums of his hometown. The other woman, the one with straight black hair and a cold demeanor, had hardly left her carriage during the journey.

Among the other horses his own mount stood waiting, a palomino mare he'd never named. She was rather dirty, now, after two months of travel in these dusty lands, and the saddle on her back, though a lightweight design, was beginning to chafe her skin. Usopp unconsciously stuck out his tongue as he concentrated on checking the straps of his saddle tight around his mount's underside. The horse nickered uneasily and stomped its hooves against the dry dusty earth, but Usopp just patted her neck gently as he double-checked the rest of the saddle's straps. All around him the rest of the detachment of rangers were readying their own mounts.

"Hey, Usopp," a voice beside him jeered, and Usopp turned to see the leering face of one of his fellow rangers, a man whose name Usopp kept having trouble remembering. All the other rangers in the entourage were like him, the quiet sort who only wanted to complete the journey, collect their paychecks, and move on to the next job. Then there was this asshole: boorish, obnoxious, and stupid, constantly picking fights and causing trouble, and the captain hardly seemed to care that he kept making Usopp and every other ranger miserable, except when the old fart's evening drinking was interrupted by the ruckus.

The fact that said jerk looked eerily like Usopp was just the icing on the cake of annoyance.

The nasty grin on the man's face grew wider, almost too wide for his face as he sat crosslegged, perched upon the rump of his own ragged horse. "Captain says we're supposed to reach our destination before noon. I snuck up to the bitches' tent last night and heard them talking about how much gold they're gonna get out of this journey. Wanna bet we're heading to a ruin full of buried treasure and shit? We should steal it, load it into a carriage, and abandon the dumb broads out here in the desert."

Usopp grunted, not wanting to dignify the needling asshole's words with a verbal response. He'd learned early on that the worst way to respond to this creep's prodding was to engage with him. Best to just ignore it. The rest of the horses hitched here had been brought into formation with the carriages, their riders waiting patiently a few dozen yards away. With his horse saddled properly and his packs loaded, Usopp mounted up and nudged the mare forward, not even looking at the man beside him as the jerk's horse began to walk beside him, unprompted.

"We don't need to let these cows pay us if we can get a good haul of gold and relics! Imagine the gold!" the asshole jeered, giggling with a childish sort of malice. Usopp snapped his reins gently, urging his horse into a trot, and infuriatingly the horse beside him sped up to match his pace, the man balanced upon its rump not even shifting at the increase in speed. Meanwhile, the distance between them and the line of mounted rangers was shrinking, but slowly. Even as Usopp urged his mare forward into a light run, the horse beside him kept up, and the horse's aggravating rider stayed sitting in perfect unshaken balance upon its rear, grinning that awful, mocking grin.

"These morons in the rangers' corps are a bunch of complacent pricks. Not a lick of ambition among them. But you and I are different, Usopp, aren't we? We both have something we want, and gold will help us achieve that thing," the creep went on, his voice carrying about the rhythmic beat of hooves in dirt. The clouds of dust kicked up by their running obscured Usopp's vision, but the group of rangers and the two carriages was still so far away, and the asshole just kept _talking._

"We're gonna be great, aren't we? We don't need them. We can do what we need to do better without others weighing us down. Who needs a bunch of boring dicks like these clowns? Eh?" Usopp finally had enough and turned to glare at the man riding beside him, his eyes meeting his antagonizer's gaze-

The depths stared back, black pits like an ancient tomb wrenched open before him. The toothy grin was wide, wider than it should be, because no flesh framed it, and the ragged scraps of cloth and hair that hung down around the bleached-white head could not disguise it. Usopp's heart seemed to simultaneously stop and begin beating to match the thudding of the hooves upon the dust earth. The morning sun, already dim, had disappeared behind a cloud as black as night, and darkness swirled among the dust clouds.

The skull's jaw opened, and a hollow, rattling laugh sounded out of it. "We're alone, Usopp. I'm all you need." A skeletal hand reached out and gripped the thin, ragged skin of the horse upon which the apparition sat, and with no visible effort the flesh tore, red sand pouring out instead of blood as the covering fell away and long-dead bones clattered to the ground, kicking up dust as the being sat there in midair, grinning and laughing. "No one."

The hand reached out again, and Usopp couldn't breath, couldn't speak, couldn't even close his eyes to look away as it plunged into the soft skin of his mare's neck, fountains of blood and sand erupting as the earth beneath them was soaked in red, and the dark dust clouds took on the same color. As if in slow motion Usopp felt gravity overtaking him, the ground landing on him as much as he landed on it, but his eyes never left to sight of the horse being ripped asunder by bony fingers, a red-stained grin biting into her skin, her eyes wild and sad and then dim, and she hit the ground with a resounding sound of shattering wood-

 _~:~:~:~:~:~:~_

Usopp's eyes shot open as he hit the pile of wooden scraps, pain lancing through his hands as splinters dug into his skin. He cried out and scrambled up to his knees, dizziness making him stumble back into the pile twice before he found something resembling balance. He sat there on his knees, panting and staring at the load of scrapped wood on the deck before him, barely lit by the dim hurricane lantern sitting beside him. Resting on its side between him and the scrap-pile was a small, battered barrel, stained black around the half-sealed lid, which leaked pitch slowly.

 _What... how... I'm..._ was the most his spinning thoughts could comprehensibly construct before a sound beside him took his attention away from the pain in his hands and the scraps in front of him, and he turned his head to see its source. In the darkened distance outside the light of the flickering lantern, dozens of shrouded bodies rested in neat rows, and a small shape stood among them, the yellow of her raincoat barely visible in the gloom. Usopp blinked, reaching up his wounded hands to rub carefully at his eyes, but when he looked again, she was still there.

"Hey... who..." Usopp croaked out, coughing gently, and the girls seemed startled at his voice. "Are you... real...?" As far away as she was, he couldn't see her face, but he saw her hands come up and meet, moving as though nervously fiddling with the strings on her hood.

Usopp stood, his knees threatening to collapse beneath him as he rose to an exhausted slouch. Low rumbling filled his ears, pulsating in time with the darkness at the edges of his vision, focused as they were on the distant figure. The raincoat girl took a few steps back, as though frightened that he'd approach, but Usopp just reached up a hand, shaky fingers clawing the air in front of him. His legs had expended so much strength bringing him up to standing that they simple shook violently whenever he tried to make them step forward, or backward, or anything. The shadows seemed to flow along the wooden surface of the deck, like a river of black fog winding between the hills that were the shrouded corpses. Like a tide they broke against the rainbooted feet of the mysterious girl, and with each wave, her color and the distinctness of her outline faded a little more.

"Please... I'm alone..." Usopp gasped, finally forcing one of his heavy, dragging, shaking legs to take a step forward, and the motion nearly sent him toppling over. In his effort to try and avoid collapsing, his eyes slid off the form of the girl in the raincoat. When he had steadied himself somewhat and looked back at where she'd been, there was nothing.

 _No..._ Usopp thought, gluey despair welling up in his head like a tide of mud, and his vision was robbed from him by a surge of tears that blurred his vision and clouded his thoughts. He felt gravity drop away, the solidity of the deck gone, his gut swooping as though he were falling into nothingness. _God... n-no... where..._

The sharp, imperious clearing of a man's throat brought him back to awareness and Usopp turned, tearing his eyes away from the gorgeous suit of traditional armor that had been occupying him for the last few minutes. In the broad doorway behind him stood a well-dressed blond man with a snooty expression; the royal chef himself, according to the herald who had delivered the summons to Usopp's humble workshop. The man gave him a quick look up and down, his lip curling just a bit at the shabby state of his work clothes, then his expression morphed into something resembling a smile.

"Mr... Usopp, is that right?" the royal chef asked, as if he didn't know. Usopp simply swallowed a little and nodded. "Excellent. I have heard from an acquaintance of mine that you are a weaponsmith without match in this kingdom."

"Uh, I-I'm pretty good, I guess," Usopp replied, smiling uncertainly and wondering who exactly the hell this man had heard of him from. The royal chef's smile became something more like a smirk.

"As you should know, our beloved queen is to be granted regency of the realm after her husband the king's untimely death- God rest his soul," the royal chef adopted a suitably mournful, somber expression for a moment, which went right back to a smirk, " -and to celebrate her ascension to the throne, a banquet has been planned. As her royal chef I am tasked with preparing the main course, the most magnificent of dishes to hold the center of her royal table. This task shall prove no challenge for my skills, but a common saying among chefs is that a chef is only as good as his tools. The main course for the royal banquet must be _perfect_ , and to that end," the man gestured toward Usopp, "I shall commission you."

"Um, sure..." Usopp said, hesitation heavy in his tone. "What, uh, would you want me to make?"

"Simply put," declared the royal chef, crossing his arms, "I require a set of knives. One heavy cleaver, one paring knife, one chef's slicing knife, and a thin boning knife. They will be made from the finest steel, with ivory hilts, and my personal crest in gold filigree and embossed upon the blades themselves, long with diamond-encrusted pommels. You will be collaborating with the royal armorer and the royal jeweler, in the royal forges. These shall all be completed within six days, to allow me the required time to prepare the queen's feast."

Usopp took a moment to realize his jaw had slowly dropped open during the royal chef's explanation, then quickly snapped it shut. "U-um... that sounds, uh, doable. D-do you want my commission prices-?" he tried to ask, but the chef chuckled and shook his head.

"Money is no object, Mr. Usopp. You will be paid handsomely; four-thousand seven-hundred ninety-one gold Berries is the first half of your pay." As the royal chef said this he reached up his hand and snapped his fingers, and out of the room behind him came a green-haired manservant, holding a small but opulent chest. The manservant opened the lid, and Usopp's jaw dropped yet again as he eyed the pile of gold gleaming within. "You will receive the rest upon delivery of my commission," the chef continued, but Usopp was hardly listening as he reached out a hand toward the gold, but the manservant shut the chest's lid, and the chef cleared his throat again, dragging Usopp's attention back. His eyes landed upon the royal chef's irritated expression, but it disappeared behind a smirking mask in an instant.

"The chest will be delivered to the guest chambers the queen is ever so generously providing to you during your stay in the capital," the man said tightly, and the manservant turned and walked away without a word, down the hall and around a corner out of sight. "In the meantime," the chef raised his hand and snapped his fingers again, and Usopp did a double-take when another green-haired servant identical to the first emerged from the room behind him. "You will follow Zolo here, and he will lead you to the royal forge, where her majesty's armorer awaits with the initial plans for my commission." Abruptly, the royal chef turned and walked right through the door he'd come out of, shutting it behind him, and Usopp blinked at it, stunned for a moment before the manservant _also_ cleared his throat.

"Please follow me," the green-haired man said with a bored voice as he walked in the opposite direction of the first manservant, and Usopp had to jog to keep up with his brisk pace. After a few turns through the massive palace's spiderweb of hallways, the servant led him outside, through an elaborate courtyard toward an isolated building. The double doors were open, and Usopp could hear the sounds of pumping bellows and clanging hammers, and smoke billowed out of the large ventilation shafts open in the roof. Inside, the manservant led him past rows of worktables with arrays of tools, past a dozen grindstones being manned by apron-wearing, sweating apprentices, and finally through another door into an open-walled area featuring no less than ten forges of various sizes and designs, most manned and roaring hot. Out in the small flattened-earth yard beyond Usopp also saw several brick smelters and piles of canvas-shrouded metal ingots.

 _This smithy is more than three times the size of my entire property,_ Usopp thought, gobsmacked by the scale of it all, as the manservant led him to the very end of the row of forges. The last forge before the smelting-yard was a huge one of the kind meant for making armor and parts for siege weapons, and at the massive anvil beside it stood a huge man with blue hair and a fake metal nose held to his face with a leather strap, pounding away at glowing bar of steel. The smith paused for a moment to wipe sweat from his brow with the back of a massive hand, then his eyes caught Usopp's gaze and he grinned.

"Weeeell, you must be that Usopp guy Sanji dragged here to work on his little knife project!" the armorer said, placing the cooling iron bar back into the forge and waving toward one of the apprentices, who came over and began pumping the bellows. The tall man wiped his hands on his apron quickly before reaching out and enveloping Usopp's entire forearm in both his huge paws, shaking his hand enthusiastically. "That guy's a pompous prick, so I'm glad you're here to take and heat from him if he changes his design requests mid-production again."

"U-u-uh, h-hi, c-can you n-not do th-that?" Usopp said jerkily as his entire body was shaken by the armorer's beefy arms. The man paused and laughed, releasing Usopp's arm and patting him on the shoulder hard enough that his knees almost buckled.

"Hehe, sorry about that!" the royal armorer said. "The name's Franky, Come on, I'll show you your work area and the concept for the knives."

Franky the Armorer led Usopp into another area of the smelting yard, off to one side, into a smaller wall-free shed containing a smaller, newer-looking forge filled with charcoal and fresh wood, with a large pulley-pumped bellows built into it, along with a small forge, a wall hung with a number of tools, and a long worktable, upon which rested a parchment scroll with golden caps. Franky had to duck below the ceiling of this small separate forge, but he reached in and grabbed the scroll, unrolling it and holding it out so Usopp could see it.

For a while they discussed the design and materials requested, Usopp and Franky both making notes in the margins of the scroll. Usopp was leery of working for the blue-haired giant, for the first few minutes- not able to pin down exactly why, but something about the man put him on edge -but in not too much time he was distracted by the planning of the royal chef's commission, and working with Franky on the project was a breeze. After almost an hour of talking Franky had gone back to continue his previous work, and Usopp stood alone, looking at the fuel in the forge, ready to get started.

The only source of flame nearby, unfortunately, seemed to be the oil lantern hanging beside him, from an oddly low hook in one of the beams supporting the shed's roof. Shrugging, Usopp took it and removed the housing, holding the small flame up to a chunk of jet-black charcoal- _it dripped, charcoal doesn't drip -_ setting it down in the center of the pile of logs and charcoal in the forge's center once its corner lit. Slowly but surely the flames spread, catching first the charcoal- _the flames licked along the black lines, running across woode_ _n_ _shards and the boards beneath them_ and Usopp set the lantern down on the floor of the shed, glass housing replaced. He grabbed the handle of the pulley-bellows and pulled down on the rope, putting his weight into it to get the forge started in earnest- _and his feet went out from under him, his hand gripping a small shape, as glowing red light spilled out into the black air, chasing away shadows to fill the space around the pyre with hellish luminescence._

"Gotta... gotta start... the steel..." Usopp muttered to himself, reaching out the grab an ingot from a storage shelf beneath the workbench- _he gripped the bar, the wood splintering as his fingernails dug into it, and the tugging on his other arm stopped for a moment. His vision blurred in blacks, reds, and a dull swathe of yellow in front of him. The roaring heat of fire filled his ears in a counterpoint to the shuddering, thudding, rumbling_ _roar that shook the deck beneath him_ _,_ _and below all that noise a small sound strained to reach his ears._

 _"-et go!... sopp, let...!" the voice said, a distant whisper in a wildfire, but Usopp heard it and relaxed his grip, and he was dragged bodily down an incline-_

He gripped his hammer and tried to raise it, to strike steel, to create, but smoke filled his eyes and he slumped back-

 _The blob of yellow was a little more distinct now, a human shape, small, with rope in hand, securing it around Usopp's waist with a sailor's knot, and suddenly the ground beneath his rear lurched_ -

"Fire...!" Usopp gasped, staring up as the flames licked along the shed's pillars and roof, sparks jumping to ignite the vines hanging from the trees above-

 _Tar-treated rope and canvas was burning with dancing heat, as the still-standing masts of the wrecked ship reach upwards, like a devil's fiery claws raised to heaven._ _Light spilled up onto the patches of ceiling that peeked through the smoke, though it was still high above the masts._ _The deck was aflame, all of it, and the plank that had bridged the two ships was gone, fallen into the water below. And there was water, tons of it, visible as the light of the burning ship reflected off the unnatural tide. It flowed toward him, slowly picking up speed, and Usopp struggled to his feet as wind and heat and smoke lashed his senses-_

It was all burning, all of it, and he stood there dumbly, watching, as he ruined _everything-_

 _The deck lurched again, in the opposite direction, at such a steep angle Usopp stumbled and had to hold himself up against the mast._ _The water reversed flow and picked up speed, rushing down a sudden incline, and among the sound of roaring flame and cracking wood came the wet groaning of aged timbers,_ _echoing from behind Usopp. He turned his head and beheld huge, dark shapes approaching slowly, firelight splashing across their bulk, but from this distance his vision was so blurry he could not make out any detail. They came closer, then seemed to fall away as the wind roared against Usopp's back, and he turned back to see the water_ _flowing down_ _, frothing and churning-_

"Amazing!" Usopp cried out, his voice full of excitement he did not feel. "We're sailing down a mountain!" The wind whipped past his face and he could hardly keep his eyes open against it. The huge red stone walls of the canal rushed by on either side of him, and he could barely hold on to the Going Merry's whipstaff. The end of the sloping river was hidden in fog, far below. It should have been exhilarating.

Usopp turned to face , standing beside him and gripping the whipstaff as well. 's face broke into a and he laughed, pointing out into the distance and shouting, " !"

Usopp heard laughter from outside the door of the galley and look past the wind and fog to see and standing at the railing, a guyline gripped tight in 's weathered hands in an attempt to control the Going Merry's trajectory. shouted, " ! !"

laughed in reply and shouted, " ! !"

Usopp laughed at 's brashness, but it was hollow laughter, with no source. He felt like he was outside his own mind, his own body, looking down on himself from above and behind. The Going Merry continued its descent upon the slope of rapid-flowing water.

 _What... what's at the bottom of this slope? Where am I going? Merry..._

A splash. Heavy, and lurching. The world rocked, and Usopp saw only a blinding light, then sudden darkness. A gentle breeze brushed across his face.

 _"... sopp, wake... Wake up... Uso..."_


End file.
